Investigating the school adaptation of children with special needs who have just started preschool education during Covid-19 pandemic

The research aims to examine school adjustment levels of preschool children with special needs during the Covid-19 Pandemic. The participants were 133 teachers (115 female and 18 male) who have preschool kids with special needs in İstanbul. For the purposes of the research, Demographic Information Collection Form and A Short Form of the Teacher Rating Scale of School Adjustment (TRSSA-SF) were administered online to the teachers. In this study, in which quantitative data were collected, correlational and descriptive model were used. The data were analyzed with SPSS 25.00. In the cases where the normal distribution conditions were met, Pearson correlation coefficients were used; when they were not, Spearman correlation coefficients were used. The data collected from the participants were analyzed with t-test, variance analysis, Kruskal-Wallis Test, and Mann Whitney U Test. According to the findings, it was found that there was a weakly positive correlation between the children's school adjustment scores and their ages, and a negative correlation between their school adjustment scores and the age of starting to benefit from special education and support services. However, no significant difference was found between children's school adjustment scores and their genders as well as special education hours received weekly. In light of the findings, suggestions for further research and applications were also discussed. Keywords: Preschool, Covid-19 pandemic, school adjustment, TRSSA-SF, children with special needs.