Latest news
Latest news
May 2026
On 21 May 2026, our former colleague Sarah Volknant successfully defended her dissertation on the topic of "Intersectional sensitivity in teacher training with special consideration of linguistic diversity". In addition to Prof. Dr Ulla Licandro (first examiner), Prof. Dr Michaela Kaiser (second examiner), Prof. Dr Mario Dunkel (examiner of the neighbouring subject) and Prof. Dr Anna-Maria Hintz (chair of the committee) were also members of the examination committee. Congratulations, Sarah!
Who is actually responsible for promoting social participation in schools?
Eva Kemler and Ulla Licandro explore this question in their article "Whose role is it anyway? Paraprofessionals' conceptualisations, actions and challenges in promoting social participation".
The interview study analyses the perspective of 25 paraprofessionals on the promotion of social participation. Based on the thematic analysis, a total of four themes were identified that reveal different conceptualisations of social participation as well as different approaches to promoting it and the associated challenges.
On the one hand, the article shows the great potential of paraprofessionals to promote the social participation of the pupils they accompany, but also highlights the special role of teachers with regard to cooperation with and guidance of paraprofessionals.
Kemler, E. & Licandro, U. (2026). Whose role is it anyway? Paraprofessional's conceptualisations, actions and challenges in promoting social participation. Journal of Research in Special Educational Needs, 26, e70113. https://doi.Digital Object Identifier (DOI)
As part of the Translational Research Centre (TRC) of the Hearing4all.connects cluster of excellence, a new research project on the school and communicative participation of children and young people with hearing loss is being launched. The focus is on the question of the conditions under which successful participation is possible in inclusive educational settings - and what barriers exist in everyday school life. To this end, the experiences and assessments of parents and teachers will be analysed and international developments in the field of inclusive education will be examined. Another focus of the project is the investigation of communicative and acoustic environmental conditions that are relevant for participation and language development. An innovative tracking tool will be used to analyse everyday social and acoustic environments in order to gain insights into everyday interaction and listening situations.
A central concern of the project is the close integration of research and practice. Parents, teachers and other professionals are actively involved in the research process in order to take into account practical perspectives on school participation and inclusive educational settings. The findings should help to further develop inclusive educational programmes and strengthen the opportunities for participation of children and young people with hearing loss in the long term.
April 2026
On 14 April 2026, Katharina Kuhlmann contributed to the digital training series of the German Association for Academic Speech and Language Therapy (dbs) with an interdisciplinary look beyond the boundaries of speech therapy. The aim of this series is to draw attention to peripheral topics in speech therapy/logopaedics and to highlight their relevance for practice.
In her presentation, Katharina gave an overview of how motor development takes place in parallel with speech development. She highlighted scientific findings on their interplay and discussed the extent to which motor abnormalities in children with speech development disorders (SES) are not a marginal phenomenon, but a common combined impairment. Empirical findings were used to illustrate how many children with SES in Germany are affected by motor abnormalities and what consequences this can have for their everyday therapy, school and life.
Together with 34 dbs members, a stimulating exchange took place on the extent to which motor aspects in children with SES can also be considered in the context of speech therapy/logopaedics in an observational manner and in the sense of interdisciplinary cooperation in order to recognise developmental risks at an early stage and ensure their long-term participation.
April 2024
Participation of children with disabilities in different ECEC activity settings - what roles do language and social skills play?
Janina Dott investigated this research question in a paper that was recently published in the European Early Childhood Education Research Journal. The analysis of observation data showed that most children are very engaged during free play and meal time and interact a lot with their peers. Circle time, on the other hand, appears to be a challenging situation for many. Language and prosocial skills are important supporting factors, while externalising behavioural problems in particular act as a barrier. It becomes clear that children with disabilities and developmental delays represent a diverse group with individual strengths and needs - this must be taken into account when developing inclusive practices and structures in early childhood education and care (ECEC).
Dott, J. (2026). Engagement and interaction patterns of children with disabilities in inclusive early childhood education and care – relations to activity setting, language and social skills. European Early Childhood Education Research Journal. https://doi.org/10.1080/1350293X.2026.2645030
Also published in the journal Special Education in Lower Saxony the article "Ich sehe mich eigentlich als helfende Hand"- Herausforderungen und Potenziale der Maßnahme Schulbegleitung für die Inklusion aus Perspektive von Schulbegleiterinnen by Katharina Arnold and Eva Kemler. The article is based on Katharina Arnold's master's thesis, in which she conducted a total of seven guided interviews with school counsellors.
From the perspective of the school counsellors, the potential of the accompaniment is particularly evident in the targeted response to the individual needs of the pupils and the promotion of their social participation. At the same time, however, the associated challenges also become apparent, such as the risk of unwanted stigmatisation as a result of close supervision.
Overall, the article offers an insight into the experiences and convictions of the school counsellors interviewed and illustrates how differently the measure is perceived and implemented in everyday school life.
März 2026
Our team's annual stay on Spiekeroog took place from March 11 to 14. In addition to discussing joint publications, there was also room for individual tasks and enjoying time on the beach.
New publication: Intersectional pedagogy in focus
What consequences does the intersectional turn have for anti-discriminatory pedagogies? An open access anthology on intersectional pedagogy was recently published on this key question.
Under the leadership of Sarah Volknant, the Intersectional Sensitivity Cluster contributed an article that develops the concept of intersectional sensitivity and outlines existing practice-oriented approaches. Using examples from music and special needs education, approaches that can be utilised for teacher training are presented. Finally, the article discusses the potential of intersectional sensitivity as a basis for concrete educational practice.
Februar 2026
The 7th Annual Meeting of the Swiss Society for Early Childhood Research (SSECR) took place at the University of Fribourg on 2nd and 3rd February. As part of the symposium "Fostering Diversity, Inclusion, and Participation in Early Childhood: Tools, Perspectives, and Participatory Approaches", Janina Dott presented the results of her dissertation project. She focussed on the perspectives of parents and early childhood educators on the participation of children with and without disabilities in inclusive early childhood education and care as well as the associated barriers and strategies for support. The conference offered an exciting insight into research on a wide range of topics relating to early childhood and provided many opportunities for interdisciplinary exchange.
In addition, the 39th Annual Conference on Inclusion Research took place at the University of Bremen from February 18 to 20. Eva Kemler and Isabella Sasso (Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg) gave a joint presentation entitled "A 'special' case? Experiences of autistic pupils and school support staff on the role of school support in autism". The presentation provides an insight into the perspectives of autistic pupils and paraprofessionals and highlights similarities and differences between the two perspectives. For example, the pupils describe a strong desire for partiality and reliability on the part of the paraprofessional. These aspects are also emphasised by some paraprofessionals, while others report individual challenges in providing support. The conference - under the conference theme "Research - Attitude - Activism" - offered exciting insights into different research and plenty of room for discussion and exchange.
January 2026
Narrative skills of pupils with hearing loss in different task formats
How do the narrative performances of pupils with hearing loss differ in storytelling and retelling tasks? This question is explored in a new article by Lara Hardebeck, Ulla Licandro, Paula Bartsch and Esther Ruigendijk in the Journal of Communication Disorders.
Using a systematic comparison of storytelling and retelling tasks, the study examines how pupils with hearing loss cope with narrative demands on different levels. It analyses the use of referential means to introduce, maintain and reintroduce referents, aspects of macrostructure, such as the global organisation and coherence of the narrative, as well as microstructural features, including lexical and morphosyntactic structure. The results show that storytelling tasks place higher demands on planning, structuring and linguistic precision, while retelling tasks offer stronger content and linguistic support due to the predetermined narrative structure.
The results make it clear that the narrative skills of pupils with hearing loss cannot be assessed independently of the respective task format. The article thus provides important impulses for a differentiated language diagnostic assessment as well as for the targeted promotion of narrative skills in the school context.
Hardebeck, L., Licandro, U., Bartsch, P., & Ruigendijk, E. (2026). Storytelling and retelling in students with hearing loss - A comparison between tasks with special consideration of referential elements. Journal of Communication Disorders, 119, 106613. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jcomdis.2025.106613
December 2025
We wish all students, colleagues, cooperation partners and friends of the department happy and relaxing holidays!
How do school and non-school stakeholders perceive the qualification of paraprofessionals in Hamburg?
As part of the project "Evaluation of school support in Hamburg", online group interviews were conducted to record the perspectives of different actors on school support in Hamburg. The article by Eva Kemler, Ulla Licandro, Annett Thiele and Karsten Speck presents the perspectives of paraprofessionals, representatives of the responsible organisations, school administrators, support coordinators and special needs teachers on the induction, support and coordination of paraprofessionals.
In the area of professional induction, both the paraprofessionals themselves and the school stakeholders use the metaphor "thrown in at the deep end" and thus criticise the lack of structures and time resources for the induction of paraprofessionals. With regard to the professional and emotional support of the activity, the school support representatives were mentioned by the paraprofessionals as important resources and contact persons - some schools also report regular exchange rounds and support offers.
The results emphasise the need for ongoing support and pedagogical guidance for paraprofessionals.
Kemler, E., Licandro, U., Thiele, A. & Speck, K. (2025). In kaltes Wasser geworfen – Herausforderungen im Rahmen der Qualifikation von Schulbegleiter:innen. Sonderpädagogische Förderung heute, 70(3), 314-325.
An international look at the participation of children with disabilities in inclusive early childhood education and care
As part of the Special Issue "Inclusive Education is not Dead, it just Articulates Differently. Approaches and Pitfalls to the International Comparison" of the European Journal of Inclusive Education, an article by Janina Dott and Ulla Licandro has been published. In it, they look at the construct of participation and how it is used in international studies to analyse the inclusion of children with disabilities in early childhood education and care (ECEC) settings.
In order to enable all children to participate equally in inclusive ECEC, further insights into influencing factors and support strategies are required. A common understanding of participation could provide support here in order to compare the results of international studies. The article therefore compares empirical studies from seven countries and analyses the operationalisation of participation. Similarities, but also differences, became apparent. In addition to the specific study design, individual characteristics of the respective context must be taken into account: Participation is influenced by factors at the micro, meso, exo and macro levels (e.g. everyday practices in ECEC settings, national legislation) and therefore cannot be viewed in isolation from key environmental factors.
Dott, J. & Licandro, U. (2025). Participation as a lens to measure inclusion internationally – The case of young children with disabilities. European Journal of Inclusive Education, 4(3), 38-45. https://doi.org/10.7146/ejie.v4i3.148430
November 2025
How do children with disabilities participate in early childhood education and care?
A new review provides answers
A systematic review by Janina Dott and Ulla Licandro on the participation of children with disabilities and developmental delays in inclusive early education and care (ECEC) has been published in Frontiers in Education. On one hand, it deals with the question of how participation is defined, operationalised and measured in this context. Secondly, it focuses on the latest international research findings. These show that children with disabilities often participate less in activities and interactions in ECEC settings than their peers without disabilities and that their participation is influenced by both personal and environmental factors. Future studies should focus more on social interactions as a central aspect of participation.
Dott, J. & Licandro, U. (2025). Multiple views, sobering outcomes: A systematic review on the participation of children with disabilities in early childhood education and care. Frontiers in Education, 10:1666615. https://doi.org/10.3389/feduc.2025.1666615
"Sometimes I just smile, even though I didn't understand": The perspective of pupils with hearing loss on participation in mainstream schools
How do pupils with hearing loss experience everyday school life - and what factors help or hinder their participation? A new article by Lara Hardebeck, Esther Ruigendijk and Ulla Licandro in the International Journal of Educational Research provides detailed insights from the perspective of pupils themselves.
The focus is on how personal and environmental factors affect participation in school - from the organisation of lessons and social interactions to the use of technical hearing support. The results show that pupils with hearing loss often encounter barriers in mainstream classrooms: High background noise, fast speaking speed and frequent speaker changes as well as the inconsistent use of technical hearing support make it difficult for them to participate. At the same time, the study shows that supportive teacher behaviour, structured classroom settings and adaptive communication strategies significantly improve participation. The students not only report on their challenges, but also provide practical recommendations for improved participation - such as the consistent use of technical listening support, visual support in class, quieter work phases and planned listening breaks. The results underline the importance of learner-centred and inclusive school practices that promote both academic and social participation.
Hardebeck, L., Ruigendijk, E., & Licandro, U. (2026). „Sometimes I just smile, even though I didn’t understand“: Perspectives of students with hearing loss on participation in mainstream schools. International Journal of Educational Research, 135. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijer.2025.102874
October 2025
Three new publications by members of the specialist group appeared in October:
Dott, J. & Licandro, U. (2025). Participation in action. observation tools for measuring the participation of children with disabilities in inclusive early childhood education and care. https://doi.org/10.1026/2191-9186/a000741
In this article, Janina Dott and Ulla Licandro analyse six observation instruments for systematically recording the participation of children with developmental disabilities. A particular focus is on how children's engagement, interaction behaviour and different activities are taken into account in inclusive ECEC. The article is available open access.
Kappenberg, A., & Licandro, U. (2025). One Call Away: Bilingual Teleassessment for Preschool and Elementary Children: A Systematic Review. International Journal of Language & Communication Disorders, 60(6), e70136. https://doi.org/10.1111/1460-6984.70136
In this article, Aleksandra Kappenberg and Ulla Licandro summarise the current state of research on bilingual teleassessment in the form of a systematic review. The study shows that bilingual teleassessment is becoming increasingly important and can deliver comparable results to face-to-face diagnostics if implemented carefully. This article is also available open access.
Beaulac, E., Kappenberg, A., & Licandro, U. (2025). Syntaktische Komplexität in der Zweitsprache Deutsch: Eine empirische Untersuchung der Sprachproduktion von Kindern im Vorschulalter. Springer Fachmedien Wiesbaden. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-658-49331-8
In this monograph, Edith Beaulac, Aleksandra Kappenberg and Ulla Licandro examine the syntactic complexity of four- to six-year-old children in their second language German. They analyse the production of different sentence types and the relationships between their production and factors influencing second language acquisition.
Closing event of the School I doctoral programme SPARK - Ensuring the participation of children and young people with combined disabilities in school
On 10 October, the final event of the SPARK doctoral programme took place at The Smart House Oldenburg. Prof Dr Ulla Licandro, one of the spokespersons for the programme, and Katharina Kuhlmann, one of the eight doctoral students, were involved from our department.
Since 2022, the eight doctoral students have been investigating the development, education and participation of children and young people with special educational needs and multiple risk burdens in cross-institutional projects. Questions relating to children and young people with a high risk of negative educational and psychosocial development were addressed across all specialisms.
At the final event, the fellows presented their theoretical and methodological approaches as well as the initial results of their research work. The event provided space for exciting discussions and an intensive professional exchange.
Oldenburg School for the Social Sciences and the Humanities
From 6-10 October, the Oldenburg School for the Social Sciences and the Humanities will once again take place at The Smart House Oldenburg. It starts on Monday 6 October with a lecture and workshop by Dr Karsten Schubert on the topic of "Why identity politics is indispensable for liberal democracy". After the lecture (12-14:00), in which central theses from Schubert's book "In Praise of Identity Politics", published in 2024, will be presented, participants can ask critical questions in the workshop (15-16:30), contribute references to their own research and discuss them together. The contributions, which are being realised with the kind support of the specialist group, can also be attended independently of each other. Further information on the programme and registration can be found here.
September 2025
From 16 to 17 September, Paula Bartsch and Dr Aleksandra Kappenberg took part in the 12th Junior Research School of the Society for Interdisciplinary Language Acquisition Research and Childhood Language Disorders in German-speaking Countries (GISKID) at the University of Lübeck. The Junior Research School was organised by PD Annette Fox-Boyer, Ph.D. (University of Lübeck) and Prof. Dr. Solveig Chilla and Dr. Lina Abed-Ibrahim (both European University of Flensburg). In addition to workshops on heterogeneous subject groups and ethics lectures on studies with children, exciting discussions took place in specialist colloquia. Dr Kappenberg gave a presentation on the current status of the project "Diversity and communicative participation in children with language development disorders".
In addition, the 60th annual conference of the DGfE Special Education Section took place from 22 - 24 September at the Heidelberg University of Education. Exciting keynotes and lectures on the conference topic "Transitions in educational pathways" were presented and discussed. Eva Kemler presented partial results from her dissertation study as part of a lecture. The presentation "'Like Mary Poppins': School support as a temporary measure? - Shaping school transitions from the perspective of school counsellors" presents the perspective of N = 15 school counsellors on their role in transition processes. The content-analysed evaluation of the interview excerpts shows a broad spectrum of attributions of meaning: While some school mentors describe their continuous support as central to the acceptance and participation of the pupils they accompany, other school mentors criticise the institutional framework conditions and emphasise the temporary nature of the measure. These and other perspectives on the role of school counsellors in transition processes will be discussed in contrast in the lecture.
August 2025
The 33rd conference of the European Early Childhood Education Research Association (EECERA) took place in Bratislava (Slovakia) from 25 to 28 August 2025 under the motto "Early Education for All: Celebrating Diversity and Seeking Inclusion". In her presentation "Exploring Participation: Engagement Patterns of Children with Disabilities in Inclusive Early Childhood Education and Care", Janina Dott presented the results of her doctoral project. The conference offered insights into current issues in early childhood education research and opportunities for international exchange in a variety of symposia.
In addition, the anthology Rehabilitation Pedagogy was published in August, in which Janina Dott and Ulla Licandro are represented with an article:
Dott, J. & Licandro, U. (2025). Promoting the participation of children with developmental disabilities in inclusive day care centres. In W. Stöhr, M. Podszus & G. Schulze (Eds.), Rehabilitation pedagogy. Fields of action in transition (pp. 117-128). Klinkhardt. doi.org/10.35468/6186-08
The book is freely available in Open Access under the following link: https://klinkhardt.de/rehabilitationspaedagogik_2725
July 2025
We are delighted to welcome Paula Bartsch as a new research assistant in our department! Paula studied the two-subject Bachelor of Special Education and Interdisciplinary Special Education in Oldenburg and Seville and recently successfully completed her Master of Education in Special Education. In the meantime, she has already worked as a student assistant in our department and in a research project at the Hearing4All cluster of excellence. Welcome, Paula!
Several articles by members of the specialist group were also published in July: The article "Motor abnormalities in children with language development disorders - analysis of standardised test results and parental assessments" by Katharina Kuhlmann and Prof. Dr Ulla Licandro appeared in the special ISES edition of the Research Language.The results show that over a third of children with language development disorders also have motor abnormalities. The derivation of holistic support and intervention measures appears to make sense in order to ensure long-term participation. To the article
Also published in the journal Special Education in Lower Saxony the article "The promotion of German as a second language for pupils with a focus on intellectual development - a material concept" by Michelle Neubacher and Janina Dott. The article is based on Michelle's bachelor's thesis, in which she adapted existing DaZ materials for the promotion of pupils with cognitive impairments. In doing so, she orientated herself on the teaching principles of the support focus of intellectual development, such as taking into account the relevance of life for the pupils, the design of learning opportunities for different levels of appropriation and the inclusion of methods of augmentative and alternative communication (AAC). The concept is illustrated using exemplary materials and offers practical suggestions for the classroom.
New impulse group "HearingTogether"
The university approves impulse group "HearingTogether. An Integrative Socio-Neuroscientific Perspective on Hearing & Social Behaviour" based on the "Hearing4All" cluster of excellence. The sense of hearing plays an important role in our social interaction. In this co-operation project with Sebastian Schnettler (FKI) and Christiane Thiel (FKVI), the social and neuronal mechanisms underlying the connection between hearing loss and social relationships will be researched. The project uses quantitative and qualitative survey data and neuronal data from the laboratory to compare the social and neuronal networks of people with and without hearing loss and to trace changes after the onset of hearing loss or after being fitted with a hearing aid. Both project components are methodologically and theoretically closely interlinked in order to understand the interaction of communicative, social and neuronal processes.
To the project page: https://uol.de/mesf/impulsgruppe-hearingtogether
June 2025
At the end of June, we had to say goodbye to our colleague Sarah Volknant, who worked as a research assistant in the Research Training Group Teacher Education 2040 and was a member of the Intersectional Sensitivity research cluster. Even though we will remain in close contact until the completion of her dissertation and certainly beyond, we wish you all the best for the future and your future path, Sarah!
The open textbook "All Means All!" is now available!
The book, which was created as part of the EU-funded Erasmus+ programme, thinks about teacher education from an intersectional and inclusive perspective and brings together diverse, international voices from research and practice.
Section member Sarah Volknant was part of the project and co-authored the chapter "Understanding Yourself as an Inclusive Teacher - Teacher Professional Identity Development" together with Ann-Kathrin Arndt, Beausetha Juhetha Bruwer and Zhicheng Huang. It encourages readers to explore their self-image as an inclusive teacher in a practical and critically reflective way.
The book as well as accompanying videos and podcasts on the individual chapters can be found here: https://book.all-means-all.education/ama-2025-en/
May 2025
Last weekend (09/10 May 2025), the spring conference of the Empirical Special Education Research Working Group on Empirical Research in Special Needs Education (AESF) took place in Oldenburg and three members of the specialist group were represented with contributions. Eva Kemler ("Who always wants to have such a chaser with them?" Strategies and challenges in supporting social participation by school counsellors) and Janina Dott (Focus on participation: An empirical study on the inclusion of children in daycare centres, family and society) presented posters on the results of their doctoral projects. Katharina Kuhlmann gave a presentation on "(Pre-)school challenges and social participation: Perspectives of children with language and communication impairments".
Many thanks for the numerous interesting discussions and suggestions!
April 2025
The summer semester 2025 begins and we wish everyone a good start with interesting courses!
Prof Licandro was re-elected as Vice Dean for International Affairs and Equal Opportunities at School I - School of Educational and Social Sciences.
In addition, Janina Dott will take on the role of deputy dean of the Institute of Special Needs Education and Rehabilitation from this semester.
March 2025
This year, our specialist group once again travelled to Spiekeroog together to work on various individual and joint projects. With the best spring weather, we also used the time for walks on the beach and in the beautiful natural surroundings.
February 2025
From 27 to 28 February 2025, the 2nd workshop "Advanced Language Acquisition" will take place at TU Dortmund University; the department will be represented with three contributions. Lara Hardebeck will present a poster on the topic "Advanced language acquisition of pupils with a hearing impairment: Erzählungen und Nacherzählungen nach Bildvorlage" and Katharina Kuhlmann will report the results of her presentation on the "Erzählfähigkeiten von Kindern mit Sprachentwicklungsstörungen im Grundschulalter unter Berücksichtigung der Home Literacy Environment, grammatischer und semantisch-lexikalischer Fähigkeiten". A further presentation by Prof. Dr Katrin Kleinschmidt-Schinke, Prof. Dr Jörg Peters and Prof. Dr Ulla Licandro will deal with the input adaptation of prospective primary school teachers.
January 2025
The new themed issue of the specialist journal Gemeinsam leben has just been published, which critically reflects on the transformation requirements and potential for the historically developed and constructed disability categories in special education in the context of inclusive education. Ulla Licandro contributed an article on "Language and communication in schools - from special needs education to inclusion", which can be viewed here.
The article "Narrative and related spoken language skills - a comparison between German-speaking children who are hard of hearing and children with typical hearing" by Lara Hardebeck and Prof. Dr Ulla Licandro, which was written in collaboration with Prof. Dr Esther Ruigendijk and Dr Bénédicte Grandon, was also published recently. The study analysed and compared the macro- and microstructural narrative abilities of children with and without a hearing impairment and investigated connections with phonological working memory and receptive vocabulary. The article was published in the open access journal "Frontiers in Communication" and is available here.
As part of the 10th Oldenburg-Groningen Workshop on 2 December 2024, Paula Bartsch presented the initial results of her master's thesis Narrative Skills in Children with Hearing Impairment: A Comparison of Storytelling and Narrative Retells . The workshop offered participants the opportunity to present and discuss current projects on the topic of "Language Acquisition and Processing".
On 15 and 16 November 2024, the GISKID Interdisciplinary Conference on Language Development Disorders (ISES 13) took place in Halle an der Saale, in which several of our specialist group members took part and presented the latest results of their projects.
Katharina Kuhlmann: "Motor skills and developmental disorders in children with language development disorders"
Lara Hardebeck: "Narrative skills of children with hearing impairment at school age: A comparative analysis on a macro- and microstructural level with special consideration of grammatical and referential aspects"
Aleksandra Kappenberg: "Bilingual telediagnostics for children in elementary and primary education: a systematic review"
It was a conference with many interesting insights into other projects and an exciting exchange with other researchers!
We are delighted to welcome Eva Kemler as a new member of our working group! She took up her position as a research assistant on 1 September. Eva is a special needs teacher and has previously worked as a research assistant - on the one hand in the research project "Evaluation of school support in Hamburg" and on the other hand in the working group "Learning and inclusive educational processes". Her research focusses on the potentials and challenges of the school support measure and the social participation of the supported pupils. Welcome, Eva!
August 2024
We are pleased to announce the publication of the article by Sarah Volknant and Prof Dr Ulla Licandro entitled "Preparing Teachers for Linguistically Diverse Classrooms-A Systematic Review on Interventions and Intersectional Perspectives". The article emphasises the need to expand teacher training through a broader understanding of linguistic diversity and the greater inclusion of intersectional perspectives. The article has been published in the open access journal "Education Sciences" and is available at the following link.
July 2024
From 15 July to 20 July, specialist group member Sarah Volknant took part in the workshop week of the EU-funded project "All Means All" at the Waldschlösschen in Göttingen. As part of the project, a textbook with inclusive, intersectional and multi-modal approaches for teacher training is being developed. Together with researchers from China, Namibia and Germany, Sarah Volknant is currently working on a chapter on "Teacher Professional Identity Development". The open access textbook will be published in 2025.
It was very inspiring to share visions on inclusion with people from different international contexts and to learn more about the importance of the topic in different contexts.
You can find out more about the project here.
In July, several members of the specialist group presented the initial results of their doctoral projects at international conferences. Janina Dott gave a presentation on "What Is Participation?" at the EARLI SIG5 and SIG28 from 10-12 July 2024 in Warsaw. And How Do Children with Disabilities Participate in ECEC? A Systematic Review".
In addition, the 16th Congress of the International Association for the Study of Child Language (IASCL) took place from 15 to 19 July at Charles University in Prague. Lara Hardebeck and Katharina Kuhlmann presented their posters on the topics of "Narrative Storytelling in Children with Hearing Impairment" and "Parental and Self-Perceptions of Social-Emotional and Behavioural Skills in Children with Developmental Language Disorder" as part of a poster session. It was a congress with many exciting keynotes and symposium contributions!
June 2024
From 3 to 7 June, lecturer Meltem Aygunes from Sabanci University in Istanbul (Turkey) will be a guest in our department. As part of the sop465 module, she will be giving guest lectures in the seminars of Prof Dr Ulla Licandro and Janina Dott on the topic of "Effective and Persuasive Communication". We look forward to your visit, Meltem!
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From June 3 to 7, lecturer Meltem Aygunes from Sabanci University in Istanbul (Turkey) will be visiting our working group. As part of the sop465 module, she will give guest lectures in the seminars of Prof. Dr Ulla Licandro and Janina Dott on the topic of "Effective and Persuasive Communication". We are happy to have you here, Meltem!
May 2024
There is currently a vacancy for a research assistant (FwN) in our department. The full job advertisement can be found here and applications can be submitted until 5 June 2024. For further information and details, please contact Prof. Dr Ulla Licandro
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The article "Narratives of children with hearing impairments - interindividual differences and correlations with spoken language skills", which was written as part of our research work in the Hearing4all cluster of excellence, was recently published in the journal "Sprache-Stimme-Gehör". Micro- and macrostructural components and their correlations with receptive vocabulary and phonological working memory in the narratives of school-aged children with different hearing losses were analysed. The article can be accessed here: https://www.thieme-connect.de/products/ejournals/abstract/10.1055/a-2103-9033
This month also saw the start of data collection for Janina Dott's doctoral project in inclusive and integrative day-care centres. You can find all information about the project and the other doctoral projects of the specialist group here.
April 2024
The summer semester 2024 has started! We wish everyone a successful semester with hopefully many interesting lectures and seminars.
February 2024
Last week (19-22 February), our specialist group travelled to Spiekeroog for the second time to work on joint projects at the Wittbülten National Park House. It was a great time with walks on the beach and games evenings!
January 2024
Our specialist group member Sarah Volknant was invited by the Department of Pedagogy for Learning Impairments in Schools at Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg to present her doctoral project as part of the event series "Differenz Bildung Intersektionalität". Her presentation is entitled "Intersectional perspectives on multilingualism in teacher education" and will take place on 31 January 2024 in Halle. Further information can be found on the flyer.
2023
December
We wish everyone happy and relaxing holidays and a good start into the new year!
The following articles have recently been published:
Licandro, U. (2023). Multilingualism as a task in speech and language therapy education. In A. Mayer & T. Ulrich (Eds.), Academic records in speech and language therapy education (pp. 318-327). Stuttgart: Kohlhammer.
Licandro, U., Amet, B. & Goschler, J. (2023). Cohesion and microstructure in picture story narratives of children with German as a first or second language. In D. Weltzien, H. Wadepohl, J. Hoffmann, I. Nentwig-Gesemann & S. Nickel (Eds.), Research in early childhood education XVI. early literacy (pp. 259-286). Freiburg: FEL-Verlag.
As part of the annual workshop between the Carl von Ossietzky University and the Rijksuniversiteit Groningen on 13 December 2023 on "Language acquisition and processing", Lara Hardebeck gave a lecture on "Narrative storytelling in children with hearing impairment". The workshop offered participants the opportunity to present and discuss their end of projects.
November
From 2 to 3 November 2023, the international symposium of the Cluster of Excellence Hearing4all took place in Oldenburg under the theme "The Future of Hearing". As part of the poster session, Lara Hardebeck presented the results of the study "Narrative Development in DHH Children - Who Tells a Good Story and Why?". The symposium offered interesting key notes and exciting insights into various areas of hearing research.
At the same time, the autumn conference of the Empirical Special Education Research Group (AESF) took place from 02-04 November 2023 in the Residenzschloss, the main building of the University of Münster. As part of the research project Evaluation of school support in Hamburg, Eva Kemler gave a presentation on the topic "'Thrown into cold water' - qualification and qualification of school support staff from the perspective of school actors". The diverse research contributions provided exciting insights into the various research fields of empirical special needs education.
Prof Dr Ulla Licandro recently introduced herself in the series "Ask the Prof" on the Instagram profile of the Institute of Special Needs Education and Rehabilitation. The video can be viewed here.
October
We wish everyone a great start to the winter semester 2023/2024! We are looking forward to our courses for Bachelor's and Master's students, including the basics of inclusive education, linguistic-communicative diversity, hearing and language development, multilingualism, scientific work and the history of special education.
The following article was recently published as part of the research project "Evaluation of school support services in Hamburg": Kemler, E., Licandro, U., Maichrowitz, S., Speck, K. & Thiele, A. (2023). School support within the framework of a pool model - evaluations from an action and control perspective. In M. Grummt, W. Kulik, C. Lindmeier, V. Oelze & S. Sallat (Eds.), Participation, knowledge and communication in special educational discourse (pp. 81-87). Bad Heilbrunn: Klinkhardt.
September
Section members Lara Hardebeck and Sarah Volknant took part in the DGFE Special Education Section Conference on "Contexts of Power - Critical Reflections on Knowledge Orders, Knowledge Production and Knowledge Transfer" at TU Dresden at the end of September. In addition to the exciting keynotes, interesting insights into numerous research contributions were also provided. Lara Hardebeck presented her project on "Participation opportunities for children with hearing impairments in inclusive schools", while Sarah Volknant gave an overview of her research project on "Intersectional perspectives on linguistic-cultural diversity in teacher training". The conference brought to light new and, in particular, power-critical perspectives on the topic of inclusion.
As part of the doctoral project "Language development disorders and additional impairments in the area of emotional-social and (visuo)motor development", data was collected at the Werscherberg Rehabilitation Clinic from March to September 2023. Katharina Kuhlmann, in collaboration with clinic staff, carried out various test procedures to record linguistic, emotional-social, (visuo)motor and cognitive abilities in 5 to 10-year-old children with language development disorders. In addition, the parents and guardians completed questionnaires to share their assessments of their children's development and participation. In the upcoming data analysis, the forms and characteristics of developmental impairments and their effects on participation are to be recorded. In addition to the data collection, the stay at the rehabilitation clinic offered interesting insights into a comprehensive range of treatments for almost all forms of communication disorders and the opportunity for multi-professional exchange.
On 26 September 2023, Aleksandra Kappenberg gave a presentation on "Bilingual telediagnostics for children in elementary and primary education: a systematic review" at the 10th Interdisciplinary Junior Research School on Language Development and its Disorders of the Society for Interdisciplinary Language Acquisition Research and Child Language Disorders in German-speaking Countries (GISKID). The conference took place at the University of Bremen.
August
European Conference on Educational Research (ECER) 2023: From 22 to 25 August 2023, ECER 2023 took place at the University of Glasgow under this year's theme "The Value of Diversity in Education and Educational Research". Janina Dott presented the first results of a systematic review on "Participation in Inclusive Early Childhood Education and Care (ECEC) - Assessment of a complex construct" as part of the poster session. The conference offered many interesting presentations and the opportunity for international exchange!
May
On 24.05.2023 Aleksandra Kappenberg successfully defended her doctoral thesis entitled "Multimodal interaction design of children in second language acquisition". Prof. Dr Ulla Licandro (first reviewer), Prof. Dr Tanja Jungmann (second reviewer), apl. Prof. Dr Christiane Miosga (examiner of the neighbouring subject), Prof. Dr Anna-Maria Hintz (committee chair) and Janina Dott (minute taker) also took part in the thesis defence. Congratulations, doctor!
Networking conference as part of the SGBF-AG "Intercultural Education" at the PH Zurich: On 25 May 2023, section member Sarah Volknant and her colleague Stefanie Scholz-Wemken will travel to the University of Teacher Education in Zurich to take part in the networking conference of the SGBF-AG "Intercultural Education".Together, they will give a presentation on "Intersectional sensitivity in teacher training" with reference to the research cluster "Intersectional sensitivity" and are looking forward to an exciting exchange on the conference topic "Power and inequality-critical perspectives on education - findings and search movements of empirical research".
The teaching concept for the seminar "Projekte forschenden Lernens im Bereich sonderpädagogischer Heterogenität und Diversität. Focus: Linguistic heterogeneity and multilingualism - a project to record and promote language development in the entry level", which was conducted by Aleksandra Kappenberg in the winter semester 2021/2022 and summer semester 2022, was published in the teaching concept collection of the University of Oldenburg. The seminar was funded as part of the "Forschendes Lernen" programme and nominated for the 2022 Teaching Prize. The teaching concept can be read here.
April
Prof Licandro was elected as the new Vice Dean for International Affairs and Equal Opportunities at School I - School of Educational and Social Sciences in April.
March
The following articles were recently published:
Licandro, U. & Kappenberg, A. (2023). "What is a dinosaur?" - Communicative shaping of peer interactions by newly immigrated children in their first year of attending daycare. In S. Schmölzer-Eibinger & B. Bushati (Eds.), Miteinander reden - Interaktion als Ressource für den Erst-, Zweit- und Fremdspracherwerb (pp. 105-120). Weinheim: Beltz/Juventa.
Lüdtke, U., Ehlert, H. & Licandro, U. (2023). That's What Friends Are For! The relational potential of peer interactions for German acquisition in the preschool context of social, cultural and linguistic diversity. In S. Schmölzer-Eibinger & B. Bushati (Eds.), Miteinander reden - Interaktion als Ressource für den Erst-, Zweit- und Fremdspracherwerb (pp. 121-152). Weinheim: Beltz/Juventa.
Licandro, U., Abuom, T. & Omari, D. (2023). Linguistically and culturally diverse children with language disorders in Sub-Saharan Africa - Approaches to service delivery. In U. Lüdtke, E. Kija & M. K. Karia (Eds.), Handbook of Communication Disabilities and Language Development in Sub-Saharan Africa (pp. 469-478). Amsterdam: Springer.
February
Our specialist group spent the days from 6 to 9 February at the Wittbülten National Park House on Spiekeroog. Here we were able to exchange ideas intensively and work together on projects and publications. We ended the evenings with walks on the beach by the sea.
January
We are delighted to welcome Lara Hardebeck as a new member of our working group! On 1 January, she took up a position as a research assistant and doctoral candidate in the Cluster of Excellence Hearing 4all. Previously, Lara completed her two-subject Bachelor's degree in Special Education and German Studies as well as the Master of Education in Special Education at the University of Oldenburg. Her research focusses on the language development and participation of students with hearing impairments. Welcome, Lara!
2022
November
Katharina Kuhlmann and Janina Dott contributed posters to the Interdisciplinary Junior Research School "Language Development and its Disorders" and the 12th Interdisciplinary Conference on Language Development Disorders (ISES), which took place this year from 24-26 November in Marburg: "How specific are specific language development disorders? Language development disorders and emotional-social and motor skills" (Kuhlmann) and "Participation and language skills of children with disabilities in inclusive day-care centres" (Dott).
September
As part of Prof Licandro's collaboration with colleagues from Australia, Ireland, the UK and Greece, the article "Perspectives of play and play-based learning: What do adults think play is?" has just been published in the Australasian Journal of Early Childhood.
On 23 September 2022, Aleksandra Kappenberg gave a lecture entitled "Das zeig' ich dir! Multimodal initiations and reactions of children in second language acquisition during dialogue-based picture book viewing" at the 34th Federal Congress of the German Society for Speech-Language Pathology. Aleksandra's contribution entitled "Recording linguistic-communicative competences of preschool children in second language acquisition. Methodological perspectives with special consideration of multimodality" in the conference proceedings of M. Spreer, M. Wahl & H. Beek (eds.), Sprachentwicklung im Dialog: Digitality - Communication - Participation. Current speech and language therapy pedagogy. Contributions for school, kindergarten and therapeutic practice (vol. 4, pp. 311-318). German Society for Speech and Language Therapy Education, Schulz-Kirchner Verlag.
Also published in September was the article on "Sprachförderung von mehrsprachigen Kindern mit Beeinträchtigung im Vorschulalter" by Janina Dott and Ulla Licandro in the edited volume by Etta Wilken (ed.), Zwei- und Mehrsprachigkeit bei Kindern mit kognitiven Beeinträchtigungen (pp. 50-62) published by Kohlhammer Verlag.
On 2 September, the journal Sprache, Stimme, Gehör 46(03), 111-112 published a summary of the article "Children who lead get the language they need! Initiations of peer interactions of children in second language acquisition" by Aleksandra Kappenberg (née Syczewska) and Ulla Licandro(to the article). The study was summarised and evaluated by Prof. Dr. Christiane Kiese-Himmel for the specialist audience. Note: the study analysed a sample of 30 (and not 23) children. To the summary in the journal Sprache, Stimme, Gehör
August
Attendance at the conference for young researchers "MEHR|SPRACHLICHE|BILDUNG - Sprachliche Vielfalt als Chance und Herausforderungen in Bildungskontexten" at the University of Cologne: Sarah Volknant presented her doctoral project "Sprachlich-kulturelle Diversität aus intersektional sensible Perspektive: Überzeugungen, Ressourcen und Kompetenzen von Lehrenden" in a workshop organised by the project "Heterogenität und Inklusion gestalten- Zukunftsstrategie Lehrer*innenbildung" at the University of Cologne. The subsequent conference opened up new perspectives and impulses on linguistic diversity in schools and its importance for teacher training.
July
Newly published in the journal Early Child Development and Care is the article "More Than Words - How Second Language Learners Initiate and Respond During Shared Picture Book Reading Interactions" by Aleksandra Kappenberg and Ulla Licandro. To the article
June
As part of the conference for researchers in qualification phases of the Mercator Institute for Language Development and German as a Second Language, members of our specialist group contributed with lectures and poster presentations. Aleksandra Kappenberg gave a lecture entitled "Guck mal hier! Multimodal initiations and reactions of children in second language acquisition in interactions with educational professionals". Janina Dott, Carolyn Andermann and Sarah Volknant presented their posters on the topics of "Linguistic diversity in early childhood education: competences and participation of children with developmental disabilities", "Language support in day-care centres: Current pedagogical practices, attitudes and training needs of early childhood education professionals" and "Linguistic-cultural diversity from an intersectionally sensitive perspective: beliefs, resources and competences of teachers" were presented. It was an interesting and exciting stay at the University of Cologne!
Prof Licandro gave a lecture at the 11th Leipzig Spring Symposium on Language & Communication "Voice - Language - Interactions. Communicating consciously" and a workshop on the topic of "Peer interactions of children with language development disorders - recognising potential, enabling access".
May
On Wednesday, 11 May 2022 from 18:30 to 20:00, Aleksandra Kappenberg will hold a free, digital webinar for Polish teachers on the topic of "New language, new school. How can lessons be adapted to the needs of bilingual pupils?" (PL: "Nowy język, nowa szkoła. Jak dostosować lekcje do językowych potrzeb uczniów bilingwalnych?").
March
Together with Dr Martin Podszus, Prof Licandro organised a discussion on the topic of "Research and teaching in differential relationships" as part of the pre-conference of the 28th DGfE Congress.
January
We are pleased to welcome Sarah Volknant as a new working group member. On 1 January, she took up a position as a research assistant in the working group and as a doctoral candidate in the DiZ Research Training Group "Teacher Education 2040". Prior to this, Sarah Volknant completed her Bachelor's degree in Childhood Education at the Freiburg University of Education and a Master's degree in Multilingualism and Education at the University of Hamburg. She spent semesters abroad at the Universidad de Alcalá de Henares in Spain and in Irvine, California. Her research will focus on dealing with linguistic and cultural diversity in everyday school life. Welcome, Sarah!
2021
December
Aleksandra Kappenberg and Ulla Licandro's article "The Other Side of the Story: Multimodal Initiation of Children's Second Language Acquisition in the Context of Picture Book Viewing" has just been published in the new volume of the series Forschung in der Frühpädagogik.
November
Current publication: Ulla Licandro's article on peer support has been published in the handbook Deutschunterricht in Theorie und Praxis (DTP), volume Sprachförderung in Kindertagesstätten.
September
We are delighted that Janina Dott is now supporting our department as a research assistant. She previously completed a B.A. in Rehabilitation Education at TU Dortmund University and an M.A. in Special Education and Rehabilitation Sciences at Leibniz Universität Hannover and worked as the coordinator of mobile support services at Lebenshilfe Hannover. Welcome, Janina!
August
Attention all doctoral candidates: As part of the Research Training Group "Teacher Education 2040", a position as a research assistant in the Intersectional Sensitivity Cluster in the field of Heterogeneity and Diversity with special consideration of inclusive educational processes is available as soon as possible. Further information can be found here: uol.de/diz/grako2040/forschungsfelder
July
What are the differences in narrative skills between children with German as a second language with and without special educational needs? This question is explored in the recently published article by Prof Licandro. It can be viewed here .
June
The article "Multilingual children with language development disorders - questions, findings and implications for practice" by Ulla Licandro has just been published in the current issue of the specialist journal Sprachförderung und Sprachtherapie in Schule und Praxis.
We are delighted that the article "Children Who Lead Get the Language They Need! Initiating peer interactions with children in second language acquisition" was recently published in the journal Frühe Bildung. If you are interested, you can access the article here.
April
We wish everyone a good start to the summer term!
Lecture announcement: On 8 May, Prof. Licandro will give a keynote speech at the II Munich Conference on Speech and Language Therapy - Multilingualism in the Context of Speech and Language Therapy.
March
Carolyn Andermann and Aleksandra Syczewska gave presentations at the conference for young researchers organised by the Mercator Institute for Language Promotion and German as a Second Language at the University of Cologne.
As part of the international co-operation with the University of Silesia in Katowice, Poland, Aleksandra Syczewska gave a presentation on multimodality in the communication of children in second language acquisition at the Logopedia Młodych conference.