Centre for Special Educational Needs and Disability (SEND)

The aim of the study: The research is aiming to explore coping strategies of deaf children to cope with the challenges they face in mainstream school context in England. In order to reach the aim,  multiple case study research using a mixed methods approach was designed from participatory research methodology approach.

The scopes of the study: Most deaf children are educated alongside their hearing peers in mainstream schools in the current educational context in many countries. The available literature indicates that there are still  a number of academic and social challenges which many deaf children encounter in their school life. Due to the results of the empirical studies in the existing literature, the academic challenges include curriculum, classroom participation, teacher's expertise, additional support, and regarding exams, homework, extra work. The empirical research indicates that deaf children encounter social challenges such as communication, peer acceptance, being the only deaf child in his or her school, negative perceptions about deafness, and issues regarding deaf awareness. The challenges may make deaf children feel stressed. According to Lazarus and Folkman`s coping theory, if a deaf child perceived any identified challenge as a stress source, he/she develops a coping process, affecting negatively their development in many ways, e.g. socially and academically. However, to date, there is  only one study focused on the issue and recently related studies called for more research about the coping process of deaf children regarding their school life.