NEE : a (in)certeza da inclusão

School’s main purpose is – or, at least, should be – to develop citizens totally aware of their duties and rights, endowing them of autonomy and critical sense, tools that will allow them, later, to contribute in a full, civic and responsible way, to the development of the society they belong to. However, school continues to hold on tight to old practices which do not take pity on the huge diversity it receives every day. State control also helps to restrain the autonomy that is said to be given to schools, by all the decisions taken and imposed by the tutorship, fact that obstructs the existence of a truly democratic, intercultural and inclusive school. As our line of work relates to Special Education, this will be the field where we intend this article to fall upon, resorting to recent past events which helped to strengthen the present and lead us to the need of preparing the future, having as main goal the possibility of correcting crucial issues to the accomplishment of a real social and scholar inclusion. Inclusion guides towards respect for individual differences, meaning diversity in what concerns curricula and teaching strategies. Therefore, school is asked to improve its practices in order to respond to differences which implies working in several and distinct fronts, capable of guiding school towards quality and, in consequence, inclusive teaching. To create an inclusive atmosphere, in the true sense of the word, beyond human and material resources, as well as time to planning and consulting, it is of the utmost importance to build adequate curricula that can respond to the different problems teachers deal with. In our daily practice, taking into account the very specific area we work on, one of our concerns is, precisely, the curricula construction to pupils whose intellectual deficits do not allow them to attain the common curricula learning, curricula that may endow them the essential skills and the fundamental knowledge to their future, in order that they may become as autonomous and independent as possible, leading them to the maximum social integration, capable of achieving a status which equals that of other members of the community. That’s why we consider that a well structured curriculum is not only the touchstone to inclusion, but also makes its implementation easier and enables the achievement of the goals in it defined. While carrying through this structuring work, it is utterly important to understand the child’s and its family’s expectations concerning the transition to “after school life”.