Special needs education and speech therapy research group

The special needs education and speech therapy research group is a research community with a particular focus on various subjects within the fields of pedagogy, special needs education, speech therapy and linguistics. It aims to strengthen and develop individual and institutional expertise.

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The research group is a part of the research division Speech therapy, adapted education and special needs education. The special needs education and speech therapy research group was established 10 years ago and its number of members has since grown. Members of the group can be found at several of Nord University’s campuses, but most members are located at the Bodø campus. In addition, the group has several associated members from various European universities.

The group is interested in recruiting more members and in strengthening and further developing their national and international research network.
The research group includes both academic staff and PhD students. Currently, we have a PhD student who is researching work with/for adults who have developed aphasia as the result of having a stroke, as presented by aphasia speech therapists, in published guidelines and by people who themselves live with aphasia. In addition, we have another person who is researching play equipment in kindergartens. Through activities such as seminars and workshops, the group’s objective is to publish their findings in national and international scientific journals, anthologies and conferences.

The main objective of the group’s research efforts is to contribute to the development of practical and research-based knowledge that can help to create an inclusive society, and facilitate good learning and upbringing conditions for children, young people and adults with special needs.

The group’s members are working on various national and international projects focusing on different subjects within the fields of pedagogy, special needs education and speech therapy, and are part of several ongoing projects. All members are actively involved in publishing and dissemination activities at international and national levels. The group members participate and plan in the preparation of several applications seeking to receive announced research funding both nationally and internationally.

Active research projects

  • The consensus study CATALISE (Criteria And Terminology Applied To Language Impairments: Synthesising the Evidence) was carried out in several English-speaking countries between 2014 and 2016. Its purpose was for the participants to agree on common terminology and a common set of criteria regarding language difficulties, to be used in practice and in the field of research.
    The programme of study was carried out as a Delphi consensus process.

    CATALISE Norway is an equivalent Norwegian study that was initiated by Norsk logopedlag (Norwegian interest group for speech and language therapists). It now includes members from Norsk logopedlag, Nord University/Frambu, Statped, the University of Oslo and the University of Bergen. The project is organisationally located at Nord University. Data collection will take place during 2020.

  • Karianne Berg and Line Haaland-Johansen are part of a large, active international research network called The Collaboration of Aphasia Trialists.

  • The research gruop contributes in the international project "Discovering Youth Perspective through Activism and Leadership: Insights from Northwest Russia and the Nordic States​"​.​​​​​​​​

  • ​The aim of the project is to investigate the developmental dynamics between students’ well-being, motivational beliefs, and performance during primary education (grades 4–8), and the role of interprofessional collaboration in supporting students’ well-being in school. Utilizing an accelerated longitudinal design, students (three cohorts: grade 4, 5 and 6, N ≈ 600) are followed over a period of three years.

Completed projects

  • An anthology that aims to draw attention to aesthetic subjects, art, culture and inclusion in relation to children and young people requiring special adaptation, throughout the whole course of their schooling, in cultural schools and in other relevant arenas. The book aims to contribute to increasing skills within the field and presents examples of good practice and research-based knowledge through scientific and academic articles.

  • This book brings together leading ECEC academics from across the Nordic countries to explore questions around special education across multiple chapters, highlighting perspectives on policy and practice as well as shared enablers and barriers.

    Heidi Harju-Luukkainen, Natallia Hanssen & Christel Sundqvist ( Eds.), Special Education in the Early Years. Perspectives on Policy and Practice in the Nordic Countries​, Springer.

  • The conference Opportunities drew attention to aesthetic subjects, art, culture and inclusion in relation to children and young people requiring special adaptation, throughout the whole course of their schooling, in cultural schools and in other relevant arenas. The conference aimed to contribute to increasing skills within the field and presented examples of good practice and research-based knowledge through lectures, parallel sessions and workshops. Public health and life skills is one of the interdisciplinary topics that is part of the ongoing renewal of subjects, and the conference was an important contribution to this.

  • Erasmus+ global mobility with Belarussian State Pedagogical University​.

  • Erasmus+ Mobility with University College of Teacher Education Vienna.

  • The anthology provides new insights into inclusion and inclusive education for children with special educational needs (SEN ) in the very different contexts of Northern and Eastern Europe. The anthology has been inspired by, and prepared as a result of, collaboration between Northern and Eastern European researchers, and it intends to bring together academic input from researchers working on a wide array of issues related to educational research and practices for children with SEN.

    Cooperation between universities from 10 countries.

Ph.d.-prosjekter

  • Research fellow: Line Haaland-Johansen

    Line Haaland-Johansen is employed as a research fellow in professional practice and speech and language therapy, at the Faculty of Education and Arts. 

    Aphasia affects a person’s abilty to produce and understand oral and written language, due to an acquired damage to the brain, most often a stroke. From three different perspectives (evidence-based clinical guidelines, practitioners’ (speech and language therapists’) views, and the views of persons themselves living with aphasia), the project explores how aphasia is described and how aphasia therapy takes place or is performed. The aim of the project is to seek to understand and articulate relevant ingredients in speech and language therapists’ (co-)work with persons with aphasia. As such, the project might also inform or maybe nuance a current, more general research dialogue on evidence-based practice.

  • Research fellow: Tone Rove Nilsen
    Affiliated with GoBaN (Good kindergartens for children in Norway), which is Norway’s largest research project within the field of kindergarten education.

    Tone Rove Nilsen is an Industrial PhD student at the Norwegian Knowledge Center for Kindergartens. Her PhD is a collaboration with Science of Professions at Nord University in Bodø.

    Tone is researching the physical indoor environment of Early Childhood Education and Care (ECEC). The main focus is on teacher's beliefs and practices with play materials regarding children`s play, learning and development. The current study is a part of the broader research project called Better Provision for Norway's Children (BePro/GoBaN).

  • Research fellow: Sigrid Ness

    Sigrid Ness is a phd.candidate at the Faculty of Education and Arts at Nord University in Levanger, Norway.

    The PhD project is focusing on the understanding of the phenomenon “emotional violence”. The project has a qualitative design with an collaborative methodology, trying to understand the phenomenon from several perspetives; literature, written documents in child welfare services and interviews with professionals and youth with lived-experience with emotional violence.

Partners

Contact person
Employee photo: Natallia Bahdanovich Hanssen
Leader of the research group

Natallia Bahdanovich Hanssen

natallia.b.hanssen@nord.no