Uncovering Diverse Perspectives and Responses to Working with English Learners with Special Educational Needs

Students with special educational needs (SEN) exist all over the world and are a key component of the diversity of ELT classes. However, most forms of initial teacher education provide little guidance in the teaching of these students, leaving teachers to feel unprepared and even apprehensive. Further, the accommodations made by teachers who lack this formal training have not been widely explored, and nor have the changing cognitions of these teachers over the course of their teaching of SEN students. This chapter seeks to address these points by exploring the experiences of teachers in Japan teaching students with special educational needs (SEN) for the first time.