Assessing Teachers’ and Mothers’ Expectancies for Social Skills of Children with Mental Retardation

Abstract

This study aims to examine special education teachers’ and parents’ social skills expectations of
students with mental retardation who are attending Turkish special education schools and special classrooms.
The participants of the research were 277 special education teachers and 562 mothers. In order to determine
teachers’ and mothers’ expectations for the students with mental retardation, the importance dimension of the
teacher and parent version of the Social Skills Rating System-Social Skills Scale developed by Gresham and
Elliott (1990), was used. The percentage of the teachers who scored each item as “not important”, “important”
and “critical” for success by the teachers and the mothers were identified. Also, the order of importance of
items that are considered as important was determined by taking into account the weighted total. The results of
the analyses indicated the fact that most of the teachers and mothers thought that none of the social skills were
critical for the academic success of the students with mental retardation. However, they considered all skills in
both forms as important. In addition, it was found that the teachers’ social skills expectations for their students
with mental retardation are significantly higher than their mothers’.