The Extent and Nature of Preschool Mainstreaming: A Survey of General Early Educators

This article describes a mail survey of general early childhood educators to determine the extent to which they are and have been engaged in preschool mainstreaming. Four groups of early childhood educators were surveyed: those employed by Head Start, public school pre-kindergarten, public school kindergarten, and community preschool/ child care programs. Participants were randomly selected from the nine U.S. Bureau of the Census regions. Of the 893 mailed questionnaires, 483 (54.1%) were returned and coded. The results indicated that (a) nearly three-fourths (74.2%) of the responding programs reported enrolling a child with a diagnosed disability, (b) the percentage of mainstreamed programs increased across the five years studied, (c) children from all diagnostic categories listed on the survey were enrolled in some programs, (d) the diagnostic category of speech/language impaired was the most frequently reported category followed by developmental delays and behavior disorders, and (e) the ages of enrolled children with diagnosed disabilities varied by program type. The limitations of these findings and their implications for preschool mainstreaming are discussed.