A SURVEY OF THE SUITABILITY OF INFRASTRUCTURE AND INTEGRATION PROGRAM FOR SPECIAL NEEDS EDUCATION

Classroom environment plays a vital role in assuring good teaching and learning process. A small classroom can cause the teaching and learning process dull and difficult. Therefore it is important that a special education classroom to be well designed and fulfil the needs of a learning environment. A special education program needs to have disabled-friendly toilets and pathway especially for students with physical disabilities, appropriate furniture and ample storage for teaching aids. An attractive and conducive classroom can heighten students attention to learn. However, there are still special eduction programs which are located in classrooms that are not suitable. This study investigates the suitability of the physical infrastructure in special education integration programs in Malaysia. Fifty two special education teachers were involved in this study as respondents. A majority of them were dissatisfied with physical infrastructure of their classrooms. They reported that their classrooms were small and unsuitable for the number of students they have. For example, at certain times, students from different classes have to share the same classroom due to lack of space. Other findings of this study includes insufficient teaching aids and facilities, such as multimedia facilities, for students with disabilities. As a conclusion, this study found that special education classrooms in Malaysia still need a lot of improvement. As such, the suggestion put forward is the establishment of a specified standard for future construction and renovation of physical infrastructure of special education classrooms in our country.