The European Agency for Special Needs and Inclusive Education (2022) emphasizes four core values for all teachers and education professionals, especially those working in inclusive education: valuing learner diversity, supporting all learners, working with others and personal professional development. Indeed, PBL has been incorporated into teacher education due to its positive impact on knowledge retention and application, attitude change and diagnostic skill improvement in prospective teachers. Furthermore, PBL, originally developed for medical students, enables also student teachers to take responsibility for their own learning by developing solutions to “problems” using realistic cases. The efficacy of this approach is particularly pronounced when students are presented with a complex problem scenario that has multiple adequate solutions.

Three realistic portrayals of children and young adults with learning difficulties, grounded in the experiences of experts in special and inclusive education, were developed to be presented to student teachers in Germany. A total of 29 student teachers were invited to identify protective and risk factors in relation to the digital cases presented. Each case encompassed individual risk and protective factors pertinent to the child or young adult, the family, and the environment. It was imperative to observe the interactions and connections between the child, the school, and the broader environment while collecting all information.

The objective of the present study is to address the following research questions:
Q1. To what extent are student teachers able to identify protective and risk factors in the given cases?
Q2. What additional information about the child or young adult, family or environment do student teachers request that was not specified in the cases?
Q3. What options and strategies do student teachers come up with to support the child or the young adult in the classroom?

From May to July 2024, 29 second-semester student teachers attended a casuistry seminar. During this time, the participants collaboratively worked on the cases using the case-by-case framework for educational assessment. This tool enabled them to present information about individual, family, and environmental factors in a structured and objective manner. It also facilitated the identification of additional information required for case processing. As a team, the student teachers tried to develop strategies as to how to support the child or the young adult in the classroom. To this end, they engaged in discourse with experts in the field, drawing upon the material provided to them, which included videos, school materials, interviews, classroom pictures, and various digital media.

The present study investigates the impact of collaborative problem-based learning on the knowledge application and diagnostic skills of student teachers. The results demonstrate that the student teachers prioritize individual-child-related factors over family-related or school-related factors. This finding is in line with previous studies (e.g. Gebhardt et al., 2022). The collaborative problem-based learning (PBL) approach is designed to augment student teachers' awareness of valuing learner diversity and supporting all learners. With the assistance of experts, the student teachers devised numerous solutions for the three cases. Any potential enhancements to the cases and the PBL approach to be made in future will be addressed.

Keywords: Inclusive education, special education, student teachers, diagnostic skills.