Research on the Integrated Training Mode of Higher Art Education for the Deaf[1]

 

Fangfang Liu[2]

 

Abstract: The development of higher education for the disabled is one of the most important indicators of the development of education for the disabled in a country, whether the support policies are perfect, and whether the social civilization is advanced. The results showed that deaf students with general school experience had better adaptive ability The integration model was more conducive to improve deaf students' school adaptive ability and social interaction awareness. The deaf students had higher demand for professional guidance and there is room for further improvement of the integration-training model. Based on the above research results and the problems in practice, this paper gives the corresponding countermeasure suggestions. The paper suggests that we should build a "trinity" integration education model oriented to socially integrated talents in art applications and improve the management system of integration education We should also improve the deaf college students’ learning support system under the leadership of the school, modify and reconstruct the integration curriculum system of arts and crafts majors, and strengthen the support and guidance of the society for the construction of integration environment.

Keywords: Deaf college students. Higher art education. Arts and crafts. Integrated education.

 

Introduction

The structural impact of economic globalization in the 21st century is also reflected in the field of higher education, where the reform of technology and information technology and the oriented needs of the knowledge economy have driven the reform of higher education, aiming at training the complex talents needed in the new era. The reform should focus on the articulation of higher education with the students’ future social life; we should unite the world, integrate China and abroad, close communication between teachers and students, and build a platform for cooperation. In the field of special education, higher art education for the deaf was proposed in the context of the reform of higher education and the development of the concept of integrated education in the world, and gradually gained attention and development (GARTNER; LIPSKY, 1987, p. 367).

Haigh and Martin (1993, p. 49) note that in the United States, once students with special needs enter schools, they use strategies such as "crowding and assistance" to meet the students’ needs with disabilities and other strategies to meet the students’ educational needs with disabilities. So those special education students can have a better academic life and better learning outcomes. According to Patricia et al. (2007, p. 12), special education needs aim to achieve curricular goals and it is necessary to provide special or adapted curricula for students through special equipment, aids or resources, altering and adapting the physical environment or special teaching methods and strategies, and emphasizing the social structure and emotional climate of the educational context. The formation of educational needs can be divided into objective factors such as social, cultural and developmental impulses and subjective factors such as students' self-development needs. With the transformation and reform of higher education in China, general higher education in this country has gradually entered the stage of "popular and universal" development (LI; QU, 2008, p. 28), and the "elite" higher education training model for deaf students cannot meet the deaf students’ educational needs (CHEN; WANG, 2016, p. 21). At the same time, the quality of education for deaf students is closely related to their employment, and the satisfaction of educational needs directly points to the solution of the deaf students’ employment problem.

At present, the Chinese deaf college students’ employment problems are quite serious, with low contracting rate, poor job stability and lack of interpersonal friendship at work, which seriously affect the Chinese deaf college students’ social integration and subjective well-being. The deaf college graduates’ employment rate nationwide in 2017 showed that more than 70% of deaf graduates did not have certain professional skills, and 50% of deaf graduates left their jobs after six months. In 2013, nationwide wide statistics and research found that deaf college students left their jobs because they were so different from their majors that they were unable to continue their hobbies and fulfill their dreams and values. Based on the results of this paper, the authors went into the case schools to conduct in-depth interviews and participant observations and found that many deaf college students believe that the deaf circle is important. Among those students, 62% believe that, given the objective factors of developing an integrated educational model and the reality of improving the deaf people’s subjective well-being, based on the deaf college students’ physiological and psychological characteristics, as well as the right brain advantage, spatial intelligence and strong practicality, this paper argues that deaf college students can choose to study arts and crafts. These ones can enable deaf college students to master and sharpen their craft skills in addition to the micro-integrated learning environment in school, where they can improve their sense of cooperation, communication, interpersonal awareness and, gradually, improve their subjective well-being based on their smooth integration into society.

 

2 Literature Study

2.1 Definition of core concepts

Higher education for the deaf occupies a crucial position in special education system of China, and the target audience of its education is generally the deaf students who have obvious problems in psychological and physical aspects. The promotion of this education is somewhat different from the general higher education. We consider that: (1) Special education can be simply defined as "an educational institution serving the hearing disabled group"; (2) Special education can be regarded as "the activity of admitting deaf people who meet the qualification requirements to receive relevant professional education in general or special colleges and universities through general or unique teaching forms, taking into account the characteristics and corresponding needs of the deaf group"; (3) This special education is an activity that takes into account the deaf population’s physical and mental characteristics and their main needs. After they have received their secondary education, they are given special professional education, through colleges and universities, in various scientific ways, in order to educate better high quality professional deaf people who can contribute to the good development of society.

In the process of this study, we can define higher education for the deaf as a purposeful and unique educational activity for the deaf population that meets the disabled’s educational conditions in China. Secondly, it is a specialized special education, which is relatively different from the general higher education, and its development is restricted by various social factors and realistic conditions.

Integrated education is developed from the "normalization" movement in Northern Europe and the "return to the mainstream" movement in the United States, and is often called inclusive education in China. UNESCO organized the "World Conference on Special Needs Education: Access and Quality" in 1994 and also successfully published the "Salamanca Declaration", which defined the concept of inclusive education for the first time It means: "All children have their own unique interests, skills and inner needs, and the teaching system should be designed and the program should be operated in a way that gives children with special needs the opportunity to participate in general education, and schools must do their best to meet the special needs of all children.”

The definition of inclusive education shows the following elements in the declaration: it is an education that firmly believes that all children are special and that each child should be taught in a differentiated way according to his or her characteristics; it is an advanced policy tool for social discrimination and social integration; and finally, it is an efficient form of organization that can scientifically and effectively increase the utilization of educational expenses.

 

2.2 Review of Literature

2.2.1 Progress of Research on Integrated Education Model

The idea of inclusive education is based on the social foundation of pluralism and equal opportunity in the West and the philosophical tradition of liberalism. Many countries have taken inclusive education as the ideal or ultimate goal of their special education development and the theoretical basis for relevant policy formulation. Different researchers and organizations have proposed different definitions of inclusive education according to their own understanding.

Duvdevany (2002, p. 379) argued that integration consists of two levels: first, equal and appropriate education for children with disabilities in a normal environment (i.e., regular schools); and second, equal and full participation of people with disabilities in the life of the community (i.e., community integration). Lindsay (2003, p. 3) and others argued that inclusive education should not be understood in isolation as being only for certain specific groups, but should be expanded to provide quality, friendly and diverse learning environments and opportunities for all. Ramsay (1993) states that inclusive education can be inclusive enough to accommodate all students’ needs, interests and experiences as long as this is what they deserve to be served. Aho et al. (2010, p. 166) pointed out that inclusive education should be richer, more diverse and more stimulating for students. Such an education should be one that is more conducive to students living in an equitable community after school, and that is not just for students who are disadvantaged in their current placement, but for all students.

Deng Meng (2009, p. 8) suggested that all disabilities are caused by pathologies, so it is important to identify the cause of the child's disability through scientific and effective medical methods. Based on the results of the identification, it is important to determine whether the child should be placed in an integrated or segregated environment. However, because identification is subject to error and may contain discrimination and prejudice on the part of schools, teachers specialists, the actual implementation of inclusive education may still prevent children with disabilities from being integrated into normal classrooms. Duvdevany (2002, p. 383) combined this philosophy with a resistance to "segregated" instruction:

All people build their expectations for us based on the experience accumulated by the disabled in the past. If all disabilities are isolated or seen as different, and considered as people with very different functions, they will not really be recognized and accepted by the society in any case. This can be said to be the strictest satire on the unique institutions and isolation system. (STAUB; PECK, 1995, p. 36-40).

 

However, Daniel (1997, p. 67) has always believed that unique education should be retained, and he believes that, in many places, unique education is incomparable to ordinary education, and it is unique because it is "unique". It focuses on special education, is research-based and emphasizes relevant empirical inquiry, which is lacking in many general education programs. This is due to the fact that the research-based specialization model is difficult to implement for all general education students, and that unwise integration is bound to increase the burden on students in the learning process.

Blackman (1992, p. 28) suggests that special education should be defined as a model of support in the regular classroom, rather than placing children with disabilities in a segregated environment; He also suggests that the development of unique instruction has lagged behind because special education has segregated children with disabilities for so long that people have ended up thinking that special children should be segregated. Pugach and Warger (2001, p. 194) argue that shadowing is not a scientifically sound programmatic strategy, but rather a measure that was developed due to inadequate teaching and learning conditions, and that it is a practical, but unavailable, alternative to unique instruction in our currently underdeveloped developing country.

In a research project funded by the Tianjin Philosophy and Social Science Research Institute, Liu Zhili et al. (2018, p. 52) followed up and analyzed the situation of deaf students who participated in the minor education study and explored how to optimize the teaching format of deaf students in China, in a rehabilitative manner from the perspective of integrated teaching.

Ren et al. (2017, p. 5) analyzed the current situation of the deaf education system in China and gave specific measures to improve it Jiang et al. (2018, p. 13) analyzed the same characteristics of two well-known deaf schools in the U.S. and summarized their specific ways of operation and organizational composition. They also analyzed the future direction and problems in the development of the deaf education process in China to build a socially acceptable teaching model for deaf students. Pang Wen (2017, p. 35) analyzed the system of higher education for deaf students at home and abroad in three key aspects, including the main body, the level and the specific distribution and number of deaf students Li Dan (2019, p. 51) pointed out the problems in the teaching of deaf students in China and proposed corresponding measures according to the specific problems. In this study, she analyzed the differences between China and the United States in the form of mass development and gave four suggestions on how to study the differences in the forms of mass development between China and the United States.

 

2.2.2 Review and Summary

In the field of art and higher education, inclusive education is an effective tool to fight against discrimination and to improve the people’s integration with disabilities. It is a practical and human-oriented teaching and training model.

The development of higher education for the deaf has gone through a process of segregated education, integrated education (with classes), education for all and integrated education in China. The research on higher art education for the deaf has been carried out by scholars in China, which shows that there is already a concern and investigation on the integration model in the field of higher art education in China. However, when introducing it into the field of special education in China, we should pay attention to the specific situation of this country and the specific practice of higher art education institutions for the deaf.

The deaf people have a great advantage in spatial intelligence, and the long-term use of sign language for communication has trained the deaf people's visual thinking skills. The habit of using visual symbols to express their thoughts has been developed gradually, which has created the deaf people's unique ability to express themselves. Compared with engineering, science, business and other art majors, arts and crafts ones, which are more suitable for deaf students to learn and develop. Therefore, it is meaningful and innovative to explore an integrated education model for deaf students to study arts and crafts.

The scholars’ research results in China have been limited to theoretical research. Most of the research methods are theoretical to theoretical, without experimental or practical proofs. The research contents are limited to the issues of teaching model, teaching management, teaching support system and other educational development. In addition, few scholars have studied the deaf students’ physiological, psychological and personality characteristics. There are few studies on higher art education for deaf students in China Few studies have explored the integration model of higher education for deaf students. Little attention has been paid to the deaf students’ social integration.

In this paper, we focus on the current situation and challenges of the integrated education model of higher art education for deaf students under the new concept of education, taking the 14-year teaching practice of the School of Special Education and Arts of M University as an example We observe the classroom teaching of its arts and crafts program. In this study, we will look into the current situation of its teaching mode of integrated education in terms of its philosophy, curriculum, education management, classroom teaching and faculty. We also find out the characteristics of its integrated teaching mode, analyze the deaf students’ problems and needs, and explore a suitable teaching mode of integrated education for deaf students.

 

3 Research Design

3.1 Research Methodology

The research paradigm determines the choice of research methods. Positivism (or logical positivism) corresponds to quantitative research, and interpretivism (or constructivism) corresponds to qualitative research., Based on the epistemology of interpretivism, it is natural to choose a qualitative research method. For this study, both the research questions and the research tools further helped me to confirm a combination of qualitative and quantitative research methods as this thesis 3.1.1.1.1.

The nature of qualitative research, which is fluid, evolving and dynamic, contributed to the examination of this study about the process of inclusion in the School of Special Education and the Arts at School M. This paper argues that it is important to consider how various fluid factors in the school, such as deaf college students, faculty counselors, educational and instructional administrators, and the dean, understand the arts curriculum, arts instruction, and how this understanding influences their teaching behaviors. As Lindsay (2003, p. 5) said, education cannot be a living education unless it has roots in the earth. Therefore, the study of specific teaching and learning models or models of training requires the participants’ full understanding, the specific contexts in which they act and the impact of the contexts on their actions, in order to truly understand the specific actions and meanings of the various mobile elements in schools, such as deaf students, in the context of school integration. As Lindsay (2003, p. 5) said, words such as doubt, belief, thought, idea, etc., must be placed and described as actions in which the organism and the environment act together, or interact, if they are to have any objective meaning, let alone be publicly affirmed.

The first is to understand the current situation and the effect of the implementation of the integration model in the case school from the core participants’ perspective of the teaching activities. The second purpose is to process and analyze the data and to obtain the deaf students’ actual needs and to use the data analysis results as an empirical basis to support the construction of a more suitable integration model for deaf students (Loveland, 2000).

 

3.1.1 Selection and Determination of Case Schools

(1) Principle of maximizing the amount of information and the appropriateness of case schools

In this study, the primary principle of choosing M school as the case school is to maximize the information. In terms of location, School M is located in the center of the city, with convenient transportation and a small school area. The school is typical in terms of the appropriateness of its educational environment; the campus environment is full of art, the building of the College of Special Education Arts is full of art and fun, and a large number of original works and art elements are posted and arranged to reflect the emphasis of the college on the deaf students’ artistic and creative abilities. The School of Special Education and Arts has established its own independent building, although the teaching management of the school is independent from the school. The deaf students have the same teaching resources as the other hearing students in the school The activities, campus environment and school resources are all strongly integrated, which is conducive to the in-depth investigation and study of the integration mode of the disabled and the disabled.

(2) The relative objective advantage of the outsider field

Many researchers use the city where they have lived for a long time or a familiar field as the case study site, which can bring convenience in terms of transportation, environment, regional culture, educational culture, philosophy, etc. However, the familiar field also brings some limitations, as long-term immersion in the regional culture, educational culture and philosophy nurtured by the familiar field will be subject to stereotypes, stereotypes, habits and other subjective factors. On the contrary, in the field of the other, there is a relative advantage of being able to capture the new group of objects that exist in the new field (Loveland, 2000). In addition, because the case school is the only undergraduate university in China that provides arts education for the deaf, it has a strong attraction to this paper, and the case school has the relative advantage of being an outsider to this paper.

 

3.1.2 Research Subjects

In this study, we obtained the support and cooperation from the faculty and students of the College of Special Education and Arts of M University. 300 questionnaires were distributed among the students with hearing impairment in four years and the recent graduates. 206 questionnaires were collected, of which 186 were valid, with an effective rate of 90%. Among 186 subjects, 73 were male and 113 were female; 106 were totally deaf and 80 were with residual hearing. The rate of effectiveness was 90% (Details in Table 1).

 

Table 1 Basic Situation of Subjects

Attribute

Subtotal

Proportion

Sex

Male

73

39.25%

 

Female

113

60.75%

Grade

Freshman

79

42.47%

Sophomore

52

27.96%

Junior

28

15.05%

Senior

27

14.52%

Long term residence of family

Urban

106

56.99%

Rural

80

43.01%

Family composition

Parents

155

83.33%

Single parent

31

16.67%

Only child or not

Yes

68

36.56%

No

118

63.44%

The ability to read mouths

Very good

29

15.59%

General

118

63.44%

Not so good

28

15.05%

Basically cannot see

11

5.91%

Degree of hearing impairment

Hearing disability level 1

106

56.99%

Hearing disability level 2

51

27.42%

Hearing disability level 3

18

9.68%

Hearing disability level 4

11

5.91%

Annual household income

30 thousand to 50 thousand

139

73%

50 thousand to 100 thousand

25

13.44%

100 thousand to 200 thousand

14

7.53%

200 thousand above

8

4.30%

Our production

In addition to the subjects of the questionnaire survey, two deaf college students, two teachers of professional courses and two teaching administrators were selected as the subjects of the interviews. In view of the fact that the study included the study of learning support systems, three teachers of professional courses, who were proficient in sign language, and one external expert teacher, who did not know sign language, were selected to conduct interviews and participant observation in the classroom. The purpose of the in-depth interview was to understand the deaf college students’ actual needs, who are the most important participants in the integrated education model, and to analyze and consider their suggestions.

 

3.1.3 Methodology of data collection

In this paper, we will enter the classroom of arts and crafts majors to conduct participant observation, and at the same time, the communication with the deaf students in their daily life and their verbal expressions can also reflect their views on integration. This paper will make full use of the class time and break time to interact with the deaf students to understand more about their preferences and the preferences for the teaching mode and course content.

In this study, we interviewed two deaf college students, a teaching administrator, a dean and two classroom teachers, mainly in semi-structured and unstructured interviews. In the deaf students’ dimension of interpersonal adaptation, the aim is to understand the problems of interpersonal and social communication between deaf students and their deaf friends, hearing friends, teachers and others in the process of learning and living in school. The purpose of the study is to understand the deaf college students’ career values who are studying arts and crafts, i.e., their job search needs and employment values, whether they aim at acquiring a skill to be a part of the society, or to realize their dreams and improve their self-worth.

The questionnaires used in this study were based on the Entrepreneurial Intentions Scale (EIS), developed by Macro (2006), the Basic Psychological Needs Scale (BPNS), developed by Deci, the Multidimensional Student Life Satisfaction Scale (BMSLSS), developed by Huebner, and revised by Liu Wang, a domestic scholar. The final questionnaire contains four dimensions: learning adaptation, interpersonal adaptation, environmental adaptation and career values. In the final statistical study, all the reverse questions were recoded, and the adaptation status improved with the increase of the score. The questionnaire was strictly reviewed by front-line experts and teachers, and it has good content validity. Most of the items in the questionnaire have factor loadings of more than 0.6 on one factor. The items reflect the scale topics to a high degree. The four dimensions of the questionnaire have significant correlation with each other, and the questionnaire has good structural validity.

The physical data collected included (1) school-level data, including internal school publications, school culture brochures and video materials; (2) teaching data, including teachers' schedules, lesson plans, teaching and research activities, student worksheets and student-made works; and (3) photographic data and how the school can make the most effective use of resources and provide the greatest possible resources for teachers. (4) Photo materials and how the school can make the most effective use of resources and provide teachers with the maximum possible resources, such as photos of the physical environment of the school, classroom layout, corridors, school motto, and the teachers and students’ activities during thematic activities.

 

3.1.4 Methods of information analysis

In this study, data coding was done through the following steps.

As the data collected in this study came from interviews, participant observation, physical observation and note taking, and the subjects involved were school administrators, teachers and students, in order to facilitate the subsequent query and analysis of the data, we used O for the data from participant observation, I for the data from interviews, S for the data from physical collection and N for the data from notes. The subject roles A denote school administrators and deans, T denotes teachers and S denotes students.

The second step is open coding, which is based on repeated grinding and reflection on the data read Creswell (2000) pointed out that during the initial reading of the data, it is important not to rush to categorize the data in order to grasp the overall context of the data and gain general understanding. The researcher first read the data word by word, line by line, and recorded some feelings, understanding and reflections while reading the data, i.e., a detailed memo.

The third step, associative coding, is to further coalesce, focus, refine and differentiate the codes obtained from open coding and the categories or themes among the codes, and on this basis, to seek a more general or explanatory dimension, or what Kaplan (1964) calls the search for "repeatable rules". Based on the degree of relevance of the codes, the categories that relate to various aspects of arts and crafts teaching were analyzed in terms of relevance, with rough correlations made on a case-by-case basis, and others that could not be categorized were considered in a separate category.

The fourth step is the coding of core categories, in which each category or stage is analyzed in depth and the information in the transcript is reassembled according to the relationships between the categories. An explanatory structure is constructed by systematically integrating the inter-conceptual relationships, conceptual attributes and dimensions. The final coding icon of the arts and crafts professional integration training model of the school is shown in Appendix II.

The main data processing methods were descriptive statistics, independent sample t-test and correlation test. Descriptive statistics were used to provide data support for qualitative information. Independent sample t-test was used to test the differences between the three variables of deaf college students' learning adaptation, interpersonal adaptation and environmental adaptation on the factor of whether they had general school experience or not. The correlation test was conducted to verify the correlation between the four dimensions of learning adjustment, interpersonal adjustment, environmental adjustment and career values, as part of the structural validity of the questionnaire. The correlation tests of the reliability, content validity and structural validity were conducted using spssl7.0.

 

3.2 Reliability and validity of research and research ethics

3.2.1 Reliability and validity test

(1) Reliability test

Reliability represents the stability and consistency of the scale. The internal consistency coefficient, i.e. Cronbach coefficient, is generally used to test the reliability of the Likert scale. The scale questions in the questionnaire are selected by using SPSS17.0 for reliability analysis, and the results are shown in Table 2. Except that the environmental adaptation dimension is less than 0.7 due to fewer questions, the internal consistency coefficient between the other three dimensions of the questionnaire is more than 0.7. The internal consistency of the questionnaire is good. In addition, the overall coefficient  of the Questionnaire for Deaf College Students is 0.902, which is greater than 0.8, proving that the questionnaire has high reliability.

 

Table 2 Alpha Coefficient Test Results of the Questionnaire for Deaf College Students.

Measurement index

Number of samples

Number of projects

Coefficient value

Learning adaptation

186

9

0.812

Interpersonal adaptation

186

12

0,774

 Environment adaptation

186

5

0.682

Professional values

186

14

0.876

Total amount table

186

40

0.902

Our production

 

(2) Validity test

Validity test is also called validity analysis. To measure whether the results reflected by a questionnaire are valid, it is necessary to see whether the results can explain the theoretical concepts of the questionnaire in most cases, so as to determine whether the data results can be analyzed in the next step. In this study, the validity of the questionnaire is mainly tested by two methods: content validity test and structure validity test.

Validity check for the content and items of the questionnaire was determined on this basis through thorough analysis of pertinent literature, reference to a number of internationally used test questionnaires with good reliability and validity, and college students’ open questionnaire survey, students who are hard of hearing. The expression data gathered, in the open questionnaire survey, were used as much as possible to determine the items. Experts, front-line special education teachers, and hearing impaired college students also provided input.

Test of structural validity: First, use correlation analysis to test the structural efficiency of the correlation coefficients between the four dimensions in the questionnaire. It can be seen from the results that the Pearson correlation coefficient of occupational values and interpersonal adaptation, environmental adaptation and learning adaptation is p<0.05, indicating that occupational values and interpersonal adaptation, environmental adaptation and learning adaptation are significantly correlated at the confidence level of 0.05. That is, the four dimensions of the questionnaire are highly correlated, and the structural validity of the questionnaire is good.

 

Table 3 Matrix analysis of correlation coefficients among the four dimensions of the scale

 

Learning adaptation

Interpersonal adaptation

 Environment adaptation

Learning adaptation

Pearson correlation

 

Significance (double tail)

 

Number of cases

1.00

 

186.00

.497**

0.00

186.00

.539**

0.00

186.00

.439**

0.00

186.00

Interpersonal adaptation

Pearson correlation

 

Significance (double tail)

 

Number of cases

.497**

0.00

186.00

1.00

 

186.00

.604**

0.00

186.00

.577**

0.00

186.00

 Environment adaptation

Pearson correlation

 

Significance (double tail)

 

Number of cases

.539**

0.00

186.00

.604**

0.00

186.00

1.00

 

186.00

.535**

0.00

186.00

Professional values

Pearson correlation

 

Significance (double tail)

 

Number of cases

.439**

0.00

186.00

.577**

0.00

186.00

.535**

0.00

186.00

1.00

 

186.00

**. At 0.01 level (double tail), the correlation is significant

Our production

 

After that, the scale was tested for goodness of fit. The main fitness indicators, obtained after the error items, were optimized and corrected. They are shown in the following table:

 

Table 4 Overall goodness of fit analysis table

Fitness test index

Ideal standard

Model results

Conclusions

CMIN/DF

1-3

1.335

Good

RMSEA

<.08

0.043

Good

RMR

<.08

0.061

Good

GFI

>.90

0.802

Common

CFI

>.90

0.963

Good

IFI

>.90

0.963

Good

Our production

 

The fitness is good. In terms of other fitness indicators, most indicators perform well, and the overall fit is good. It shows that there is a high agreement between theory and actual data. The results of the scale are convincing, and the structural validity of the scale is good.

This study improves the reliability and effectiveness of data analysis through the following methods:

First, triangular mutual evidence is used to improve the validity. Information is collected and compared from different perspectives, such as managers, teachers, students, etc., mainly by comparing the observation and interpretation of different research objects on the integrated training mode of arts and crafts. Data from different sources are used for mutual comparison, including physical data, in-depth interviews and participatory observations.

Second, the personnel verification method is used to collate the recording transcription, interview and observation records. After that, it feeds them back to the researchers to ensure the authenticity and accuracy of their core data. Third, the objectivity of the coding process. Students, who belong to the same major and researchers, are invited to code the interview data for three times, compare the codes of different researchers and ensure the objectivity of the coding process through the consistency of the coding.

Finally, reflect on researchers as research tools to ensure that the researchers are value neutral in research. Through the continuous improvement of this process, the sensitivity of researchers, research objects and the relationship between researchers and research objects can be improved The researchers’ capacity should be guaranteed as much as possible.

This research opens access to the case school and gives a detailed description of the purpose and situation of the study to the personnel who need to participate in the study. In the process of qualitative interviews, in order to obtain more realistic information, especially when the research issues are sensitive, some researchers may use covert access. It is also feasible to conduct covert research in the educational environment. It is often necessary to conceal, from the participants, the fact that the research has being conducted or its real purpose. This research does not deal with sensitive subjects. But it enters the research field in the open and provides a general description of the research purpose to the principal, grade group leader, teachers, parents, and other relevant personnel, as well as who I am and what kind of research topic I am working on. I then go on to specify my research purpose as the research moves along. The public has a guaranteed right to know about the research object. In order to respect the subject's rights, the research also uses anonymous processing when presenting questionnaire data and other materials and avoids exposing the subject's image.

 

4 A Comprehensive Exploration of the Integrated Cultivation Model of Higher Arts Education for the Deaf

4.1 Comprehensive discussion based on research findings

Based on the results of the data processing, the following conclusions were drawn from the comprehensive analysis of the scale data using SPSS17.0.

According to the purpose of the study, the differences in the three variables of academic adaptation, interpersonal adaptation and environmental adaptation among the deaf college students, with and without general school experience, were tested. This indicates that deaf college students, with and without general school experience, have different assessments of academic adaptation, interpersonal adaptation and environmental adaptation. The deaf college students, with and without general school experience, have different assessments of academic adaptation, interpersonal adaptation and environmental adaptation. The benefits of a general school education, which provides more opportunities for deaf students to interact with the hearing population and the outside world, as well as a platform for joint learning and extensive interaction, are unparalleled by special school education. In the school environment, the learning mode of integration is more conducive to the deaf students’ school adaptation ability.

The results of the questionnaire analysis show that most of the deaf students have good interpersonal skills in school, and the integration of college teaching and school environment is conducive to the deaf students’ development of interpersonal skills. However, it is common for deaf college students to feel frustrated due to the communication barrier, and there are still problems in the deaf college students’ self-esteem and self-confidence. Therefore, it is important to pay attention to how to transform school adaptation into social adaptation in the construction of the integrated education training model.

The data of this dimension showed that there were 9 items under the learning adaptation dimension. The results of the seven items showed that deaf college students had higher needs for professional guidance, and the specific needs for academic guidance were, in descending order, extra tutoring in art, elective art courses, lectures for deaf students, sign language interpretation, instant typing services, online learning resources and speech recognition training.

Based on the research and discussion on the current situation of inclusive education at three levels, namely, the campus culture construction of inclusive concept, the management of inclusive education at the College of Special Education and Arts and the implementation of inclusive teaching in arts and crafts, the following conclusions are drawn.

First of all, M School focuses on the spirit of freedom and openness. Its school philosophy has promoted the campus culture construction of integrated education, which has provided cultural guidance of the integration concept, support for the opening and development of the special education art institute support for the expansion of the enrollment of the special education art institute and for the expansion of the student population. It has also provided provision of school-wide integrated education resources, leadership in the special education teachers, sign language teachers and interpreters’ recruitment and campus logistical settings. The School of Special Education and the Arts provides important support for the integration concept, values and teaching practices.

Secondly, the integration education model of the College of Special Education and Arts is different from the traditional "classroom" integration model in four aspects: integration of curriculum content, integration of teaching resources, integration of campus environment and integration of social network. The use of teaching methods such as "appreciation education method" and "top student transfer method" provides a good educational environment to support the deaf students’ learning. Under the teachers’ leadership and guidance, students adopt inquiry, cooperation and meaningful construction methods of learning, which is conducive to the starting and ending points of the integration model of the School of Special Education and Arts. In the case school, they are to improve the technical skills and social integration of the deaf students. But the support and guidance of the leadership of the school, in social integration training, is not enough, and the integration model of the school has room for further development and improvement. However, the leadership of the college does not provide enough support and guidance for social integration training.

Again, according to the analysis of the deaf people’s physiological and psychological characteristics, deaf people have the advantage of left vision and right brain, spatial intelligence, visual thinking ability and the capacity to concentrate and do things differently from the hearing people. It is tentatively believed that the "practical-oriented" arts and crafts major is suitable for deaf college students and can promote deaf college students too. In addition, it is a good way for the deaf to learn arts and crafts, which is an effective way for them to open themselves and gain an open mind The implementation of the integration model in the arts and crafts program is conducive to the improvement of the deaf college students’ character and personality.

In conclusion, there are limitations in the credit system, studio system and classroom learning support system of the arts and crafts program in the case school. we will try to give specific suggestions for improvement and construction in the following subsections.

 

4.2 Construction of the integration training model of higher art education for the deaf

Based on the deaf people’s "small scale" and "elite" higher education cultivation model in China, it is necessary to build a "trinity" integration education model oriented to the innovative talents of art and application. It is imperative to build a "trinity" integration model to cultivate innovative talents with artistic application.

The "trinity" model of integration education not only focuses on the cultivation of deaf students' skills in craft production and the mastery of social skills, but also focuses on the cultivation of deaf students' comprehensive quality, social integration ability and basic interpersonal skills in society, i.e., promoting the joint development of quality, skills and integration. The goal of the integrated education and training model is to cultivate high quality and innovative talents, which meet the needs of the labor market and the new economy and society. So that deaf students can find their self-worth, improve their self-confidence and enhance their subjective sense of well-being. However, this model should focus on the combination of school adaptation and social adaptation to create a comprehensive and harmonious learning environment for deaf college students. So that students can adapt to society in advance during their four years of undergraduate study and lay a good foundation for their social adaptation ability.

As a "practical" art for deaf people, the arts and crafts major, combined with the trend of integrated education, the demand of labor market and the results of the research on deaf college students, suggests that the cultivated talents should have strong hands-on production ability and art design creation ability. It also suggests that they are able to analyze the trend of arts and crafts and market demand by sensing the trend of arts and crafts. At the same time, it is recommended that deaf college students should be trained with social integration and interpersonal skills, unlike the training goals for hearing students in art colleges of general higher education. This should be the overall goal of talent training. This is in line with the “trinity” model of integration training.

The majority of higher education institutions for the deaf in China evaluate the students’ academic performance by the total credits of the four academic years together. And they take the total credits of the four academic years that have reached certain standards as the basis for graduation. This credit system, which lacks systematic planning and neglects the integration of students, will reduce the deaf students’ motivation and learning efficiency.

The credit system proposed here suggests that each deaf student should accumulate 124 credits in four academic years and graduate after completing 124 credits. This amount of credits includes 60 credits of required courses and 64 credits of specialized ones, divided into two categories: major courses and elective courses, each of them accounting for 32 credits. After their sophomore year, deaf students will select a major course and a required course of their interest from the open major courses displayed on the website of the school, with different credits for different majors. 124 credits are required for deaf students in their junior and senior years, and on this basis, deaf students will be guided to choose other art minors, do their own internship, or participate in a program with their teachers’ permission. In particular, four courses, namely, Sign Language and Communication, Deafness and Society, Mental Health and Career Planning, will be offered as major courses, each one of them with 8 credits, in order to promote the choice of major courses for deaf students and to promote their awareness of social integration and interpersonal communication.

The studio system is designed based on the virtual integration of the work process and the logic of the simulated work structure, which can be regarded as an extension of the classroom teaching. In addition to the instructors’ professional team, the studio can also conduct an open selection and recruitment process among the best deaf graduates, and those who meet the two-way selection criteria can enter the studio after a voluntary application and examination. The staff is not fixed and is subject to periodic adjustments through periodic evaluations.

The studio does not directly undertake art and craft design tasks, but rather organizes daily teaching through virtual work assignments or group design projects, with the aim of integrating school teaching and social work through the "studio" as a window of interface. So those students have the awareness of active interpersonal interaction and social integration. In this paper, it is argued that the studio system can supplement the daily classroom art teaching with a virtual integrated work environment. So those students can receive multiple educational inspirations of art, technology, society, integration and interaction at the same time.

The main objective of higher education is to cultivate comprehensive quality and stimulate innovation consciousness, and the most important feature of the integration training mode is to focus on the deaf college students’ cultivation of social integration ability. Therefore, for the curriculum of arts and crafts, it should focus on the deaf college students’ improving the social integration quality and interpersonal communication ability on the basis of strengthening the deaf students’ comprehensive quality and craft skills, that is, the integration. The construction of the curriculum system is led by the element of "integration", and the three elements of "quality", "skills" and "integration" are developed synergistically.

In particular, first of all, the curriculum should be connected with the deaf students’ actual foundation, the teaching contents should be reasonably arranged, and suitable teaching and teaching materials should be selected. On the one hand, the gap of knowledge, after the deaf students enter the university, should be avoided and, on the other hand, it should guarantee the "necessary and sufficient" knowledge for the disabled students to learn professional skills. For example, the teaching of ideological and political quality courses, such as "Mao Introduction", focuses on strengthening the deaf students’ professional quality education. The teachers train the deaf students' sense of cooperation and interpersonal consciousness through the skillful use of sign language, the production of multimedia courseware, videos and other visual teaching methods and teaching methods. They cultivate the deaf students' sense of social integration in the academic exchange and cooperation.

The course is designed to help deaf students to master the basic language skills and writing skills, and to develop their understanding of professional knowledge.

In addition, the course is designed to enhance the deaf students’ skills in the field of arts and crafts.

Last but not least, the integration mode should focus on the deaf students’ social adaptation ability. It is not enough to teach in the classroom only through explicit integration education, but also through a large number of implicit integration education courses in the three-year university life. So that the deaf students can get out of the closed psychology and quickly integrate into the hearing students’ college group, and enhance the communication and integration into the mainstream society. The students will be able to integrate into the mainstream society.

 

5 Summary and outlook

The present study focuses on the current situation and challenges of the integration education model of higher art education for the deaf in the new concept of case schools. In this study, we will look into the current situation of its teaching mode of integrated education in terms of its philosophy, curriculum, education management, classroom teaching and faculty, and we find out the characteristics of its teaching mode of integrated education. The aim of this study is to investigate the teaching rules of higher art education for deaf students, and to improve the integrated education model of higher art education for them.

This study has the following limitations: firstly, the researcher was accompanied by a sign language interpreter during the interviews with the deaf college students, but this may affect the collection and acquisition of qualitative research data during the interviews and communication with the deaf college students; secondly, there is a limitation of the research time, because the distance between the case school and the researcher's own geographical location, which is relatively long. The research schedule of this study was so tight that we only had two months to conduct participant observation and interviews, which did not allow us to make many trips to the case schools We could have conducted a semester-long comprehensive study of the integration model of arts and crafts education in accordance with the time pattern of the case schools.

Second, based on the deaf college students’ psychological characteristics, the structured interview method, which was conducted in a direct question-and-answer format, may not be able to obtain a comprehensive understanding of the students' problems. If there is an opportunity in the future, a more detailed design can be made for the selection of the subjects.

Finally, based on the reflection of the sample size, the initial idea of the study was to conduct a cross-school comparative study, based on two case schools, and to select the colleges and universities in China that have done a good job in the integration of art education. But if we did so, the differences between the schools might be too great due to different regional cultures and school philosophies. And it would be impossible to compare the similarities and differences. If a follow-up study is conducted, the sample size will be expanded to study the impact of different regional cultures and school philosophies on the integration of higher arts education for the deaf.

 

PESQUISA SOBRE O MODO DE TREINAMENTO INTEGRADO DE ENSINO SUPERIOR DE ARTES PARA SURDOS

Resumo: Uma das medidas mais significativas do progresso de uma nação, no fornecimento de educação para pessoas com deficiências, bem como uma medida de quão bem seus sistemas de apoio operam e quão longe a sociedade se encontra, em seu desenvolvimento social, é o crescimento do ensino superior para pessoas com deficiências. Os resultados indicaram que os alunos surdos com experiência escolar geral apresentaram melhor adaptabilidade. O modelo de integração era mais adequado para aumentar a conscientização dos alunos surdos sobre a interação social e a adaptabilidade escolar. Ademais, os alunos surdos tinham uma demanda maior por orientação profissional. No entanto, é importante observar que o modelo de treinamento de integração ainda possui espaço para aprimoramentos. Com base nos resultados das referidas pesquisas e nos problemas da prática, o presente artigo apresenta as sugestões e pareceres de contramedidas correspondentes. O artigo sugere que devemos construir um modelo educativo de integração baseado no conceito “trindade”, orientado para talentos socialmente integrados em aplicações artísticas, aperfeiçoar o sistema de gestão da educação de integração, melhorar o sistema de apoio ao aprendizado de estudantes universitários surdos sob a liderança da escola, modificar e reconstruir o sistema curricular de integração das áreas de arte e artesanato e fortalecer o apoio e a orientação da sociedade para a construção de um ambiente de integração.

Palavras-chave: Estudantes universitários surdos. Ensino superior de artes. Artes e artesanato. Educação integrada.

 

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Received: 27/07/2022

Approved: 27/09/2022



[1] This work is the project founded by the 2019 Heilongjiang Provincial Universities Basic Scientific Research Business Fund Project, fund project title: "Applied Research on Creative Practice in Higher Special Education" (KYYWF10236190141); The 2021 Heilongjiang Provincial Education Science Planning Key Project, "Practical Exploration of Combining Traditional Elements and Leather Carving and Color Dyeing in Higher Special Education" (GJB1422381); The 2021 Higher Education Teaching Reform Project in Heilongjiang Province, "Study on the Promotion of Innovation and Entrepreneurship Education of Leather Carving and Color Dyeing Process in Higher Special Education" (SJGY20211013).

[2] School of Art and Design, Suihua University, Suihua, 152000 - China. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-8833-9612. E-mail: liu8fangfang@126.com.