PREDICTORS RELEVANT TO SOCIAL PARTICIPATION OF STUDENTS WITH CEREBRAL PALSY IN ELEMENTARY SCHOOLS IN THE CZECH REPUBLIC
Abstract
The main aim of the paper is to identify factors that could, in advance, determine social participation in students with cerebral palsy in elementary schools in the Czech Republic. Social participation is within this paper viewed from the perspective of independent execution of non-academic school activities which students perform daily in the school environment.
The ability to perform non-academic school activities is a prerequisite for fulfilling academic tasks. The study included 75 pupils with cerebral palsy, 6 to 12 years old, who attended elementary schools (mainstream and schools for students with special educational needs) from the first to the sixth grade.
To assess their participation in the school environment, we used the third part of the SFA (The School Function Assessment) questionnaire showing the participation of students in the twenty-one school activities. As independent variables, we have determined nine individual factors that relate to the characteristics of students with cerebral palsy and one environmental factor that relates to the type of school the students attend.
The extent of impairment of students' gross motor and manual ability was assessed by the GMFCS (Gross Motors Classification System) and MACS (Manual Ability Classification System) scales. In this paper, we present results from the multiple regression analysis of all ten predictors concerning the execution of twenty-one non-academic school activities of students with cerebral palsy.
The results indicate the importance of manual skills, gross motor skills, and intellectual abilities of respondents as significant predictors of their social participation in the school environment in the Czech Republic.