Preparing special educators to teach second language to students with learning disabilities in the United Arab Emirates: an experimental study

Consistently, it has been reported that children with disabilities struggle to acquire literacy skills. Although there is evidence that students with learning disability are not given requisite support in classrooms, there is limited research on training or interventions which could equip teachers with requisite pedagogical skills to teach literacy to students. This experimental study assessed the effectiveness of training intervention intended to develop the literacy skills of pre-service special education teachers in the United Arab Emirates. Guided by Bandura’s social cognitive learning theory, this experimental study aimed to understand the impact of training on literacy skills of pre-service special education teachers. The performances of experimental (n = 5) and control (n = 8) groups in English reading and writing activities were compared at pre- and post-tests. The data were analyzed using means, Mann–Whitney U tests and Wilcoxon signed rank test. While experimental and control groups did not differ at pre-test, some differences were observed between the experimental and control groups at post-test. For instance, differences were found between participants on pre-English reading time and post-English reading time, z = −1.08, n = 13, p = 0.02, with a moderate effect size, r = .30. The results of study underscore the need for curriculum revision and targeted literacy training for pre-service special education teachers. Other study implications are discussed.