Selective Adaptation in Resource-Constrained Settings: A Grounded Theory Study of Inclusive Teaching Practices in Pakistani Primary Schools

Dialogue Social Science Review (DSSR) www.thedssr.com ISSN Online: 3007-3154 ISSN Print: 3007-3146 Vol. 3 No. 11 (November) (2025) 15 Selective Adaptation in Resource-Constrained Settings: A Grounded Theory Study of Inclusive Teaching Practices in Pakistani Primary Schools Dr Tahira Batool Bokhari Associate Professor, Department of Education, Government College for Women, Jhang Email: [email protected] Dr Faisal Anis Assistant Professor, Department of Education, School of Social Sciences and Humanities, University of Management and Technology, Lahore Email: [email protected] Dr. Muhammad Jamil Lecturer, Department of Education, Government College Women University, Sialkot Email: [email protected] ABSTRACT This grounded theory paper reveals how inclusive education with limited resources is carried out via the process of selective adaptation of teachers-strategic forms of prioritizing, simplifying, improvising and negotiating the inclusion processes within the constraints of the systems. Taking the notion of adaptation as a departure and difference with the ideals of inclusion, this study identifies adaptation as an advanced professional practice that should be supported and developed. Primary school teachers in Pakistan have shown dedication and initiative towards ensuring inclusion in primary Pakistan education center in spite of the lack of resources, but this have been short-changed by structural limitations which can only be challenged by systemic solutions and not a single measure. Going forward, the inclusion scholarship and policy need to confront the issue of resource limitations but stay true to the education equity and learn ways to proceed that would help teachers in these complicated realities and not overload them. Appropriate selective accommodation is not the abandonment of the inclusion ideals, but enroute to their gradual achievement in realities where total change is something remote, but equity demands are too urgent. Keywords: Selective Adaptation, Inclusive Education, Grounded Theory, Resource-Constrained Settings, Pakistani Primary Schools, Teacher DecisionMaking, Pedagogical Modification Introduction Inclusive education has become an international demand, promoted in international documents that establish this policy, such as the Salamanca Statement or the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 4, a provision of equitable quality education to all learners (UNESCO, 2015). Nonetheless, where Western-centric models are not applicable to conceptualize teaching and education through inclusive pedagogies due to Dialogue Social Science Review (DSSR) www.thedssr.com ISSN Online: 3007-3154 ISSN Print: 3007-3146 Vol. 3 No. 11 (November) (2025) 16 resource constraints, such countries offer distinct obstacles, which also need theoretical reimagination (Singal, 2019). Pakistan, one of such intricate education environments defined by underdeveloped infrastructures, poor training of teachers, and the continued sociocultural barriers serve as good examples of situations in which the global placing requiring inclusion in the system are not observed due to structural impediments (Noor et al., 2025; Saleem et al., 2025; Waqar et al., 2025). This paper uses grounded theory approach to examine the practice of primary school teachers in Pakistan as an instance of selective adaptation strategy of giving appropriate adjustment and priority to inclusion practices in limited situations. Selective adaptation explains the processes where teachers are making conscious decisions concerning the elements which can be absorbed, adapted or avoided regarding pedagogical frameworks according to realities in the situation (O'Donoghue & Chalmers, 2000). All the opportunities of inclusivity in the education process are stressed in the framework of global dialogue, but when the situation is marked by the shortage of both financial and human resources, teachers in the context of developing situation have to overcome the conflict between policy idealism and practical restrictions (Miles & Singal, 2010). These adaptive systems are connected to understanding the context-responsive inclusion strategies that need to consider the structural contexts but promote educational equity. The education system of Pakistan has more than 24.61 million students in primary education, but there is a consistent challenge of a shortage of teachers, poor-quality facilities, and the lack of resources among students with different needs. Even though the policy pledges inclusive education provisions in the National Education Policy and provincial approaches, it has not yet been implemented in a manner that is consistent (Majoko, 2019). The teachers as an interface between the policy and practice use tacit knowledge and situational reasoning to render the inclusion operationally possible in their respective situations (Anis et al., 2025; Waqar et al., 2024b; Waqara et al., 2024). This paper builds a substantive theory on how selective adaptation strategies of teachers emerge, evolve, and impact inclusion to the provision of education in Pakistani primary schools. Literature Review Inclusive Education in Developing Contexts An inclusive education scholarship is largely the creation of western context, and indicative of epistemological incongruity, when transferred to developing countries with different sociocultural, economic and infrastructural realities (Srivastava et al., 2015). The social model of disability as a major part of the theory of inclusive education also focuses on systemic obstacles rather than on the lack of deficiency in individuals. Its use, however, in situations where the educational infrastructure under basic levels is not sufficient, places eminent importance on the alignment of idealistic only structures with material restrictions of teachers (Rashid et al., 2024; Saif et al., 2024; Waqar et al., 2024a). The studies conducted on South Asian settings indicate that implementation of inclusive education is facilitated by teacher beliefs, community attitudes, availability of resources as well as institutional support systems (Ahsan & Burnip, 2007). Specifically, to the subject of Pakistan, problems that are highlighted in the studies point to high studentteacher ratios (more than 60 in the classroom), limited and very little special education (training), lack of assistive technology, and socio-cultural stigma of disability and difference (Saleem, Muhammad, et al., 2021a, 2021b; Saleem, Muhammad, & Qureshi, Dialogue Social Science Review (DSSR) www.thedssr.com ISSN Online: 3007-3154 ISSN Print: 3007-3146 Vol. 3 No. 11 (November) (2025) 17 2021; Saleem et al., 2023). Teachers report that they are not ready and supported in using inclusive practices and most have soon-acquired informal responsiveness that addresses facing diverse learners (Muhammad, Waqar, et al., 2024a, 2024b, 2024d). Teacher Agency and Adaptive Practice Teacher agency, or the ability of education workers to become agents to act upon positively in their professional settings, turns out to be one of the key aspects regarding implementation of inclusion (Priestley et al., 2015). It is not so random acts of reception of policy, but as active interpreters of the pedagogical dictates that teachers are resolute to interpret, adapt, and modify in relation to the knowledge they possess in each situation (according to their inherent constraints). This agentic view leads to the redefinition of the role of teacher as a curriculum-maker who makes sustained choices regarding the options that are possible and significant practices. The concept of selective adaptation informs that teachers choose which ways to employ when they are faced with limited resources as an inclusive way of teaching (O'Donoghue & Chalmers, 2000). All teachers gain some practical wisdom which aids in making decisions that are best in assisting students under the existing constraints. It is flexible capability that presents professional based skills to advance needs and limited resources but at the same time upholding inclusive values. Grounded Theory and Educational Practice Grounded theory methodology was initially advanced by Glaser and Strauss (1967) and, after repeated inclusion of additional methods in grounded theory, countries like Strauss Strauss and Corbin (1990) have helped in supplying recognition tools to make development of theory using the help of empirical proof. In educational research, grounded theory allows exploring the complex social processes, especially the formation of decisions and practices by teachers in naturalistic environments (Charmaz, 2014). Strauss approach of coding with specializations on systematic coding and the selection of codes as follows: open, axial and selective codes play a role of identifying the relationships between conditions, actions, and consequences that construct professional practices. The grounded theory is especially suitable when the issues are the phenomena that are referred to by one of the existing theories that offer inadequate explanations to the formed variations in practice or when situational peculiarities reject the necessity of new theoretical formulations (Birks & Mills, 2015). This selective adaptation within the resource constrained conditions is a phenomenon that should be studied, one which theory should be constructed through experience but considering the kind of conditions the Pakistani teachers have experienced and how they arrive at their decision. Methodology Research Design The researchers have used the Strauss method of grounded theory in developing a substantive theory of selective adaptation in inclusive teaching practices. The systematic data collection and constant comparative analysis were incorporated in the research design in order to determine patterns, relationships, and theoretical constructs derived out of the experiences of the participants. Data analysis and data collection were done iteratively, as some insights emerged to guide further sampling and enquiring (Bokhari et al., 2025; Muhammad, Safdar, et al., 2024; Muhammad, Waqar, et al., 2024c). Dialogue Social Science Review (DSSR) www.thedssr.com ISSN Online: 3007-3154 ISSN Print: 3007-3146 Vol. 3 No. 11 (November) (2025) 18 Context and Participants The research was on six primary schools of Punjab province, including three urban schools in Lahore and three rural schools in the nearby districts. Purposive sampling was used to sample schools to provide a balanced sample of resource setting, student population and setting of contexts of inclusion. Theoretical sampling was then used to select other participants as regards advanced categories that seemed to be identified during analysis as to be developed further. The sample consisted of 24 primary school teachers (18 women and 6 men) whose teaching experience was between 3 and 18 years. The teachers were of different subjects and grades (all grades 1-5) and the size of the classes was varied (between 42 to 68 students). Sixteen of the teachers described that they had very little pre-service practice in inclusive education (one course on average) and eight of the teachers had no training in inclusive education. All the participants were instructing the courses that enrolled learners with a variety of needs, such as learning disabilities, physical and hearing impairments, as well as behavioral issues. Data Collection Data was collected in four months and via multiple approaches thus establishing triangulation as well as theoretical saturation. All the 24 participants were interviewed using semi structured interviews to explore how teachers understand the concept of inclusion, how they go about teaching, what are some of the challenges they face, how they adapt and finally, how they make decisions. Interviews were carried out on a 45-75 minute duration, running in Urdu and English (depending on their choice), which were recorded and transcribed verbatim. In classroom observations (72 hours were spent altogether, 3 hours per teacher), actual teaching in practice, physical classroom settings, interactions of teachers and students, and adaptive strategies were observed. Field notes were used to record context education, instructional changes, the use of resources, and the interaction of the classroom. The discussion of shared experiences, method of action in solving problems and institutional influences on practice was explored by four focus group discussion (6 people each). Data Analysis The data analysis was conducted in accordance with systemic analyses as recommended by Strauss and Corbin (1998) which commences with open coding used in coining concepts and properties within data segments. The original codes consist of managing big classes, improvising materials, concentrating on dire needs, and balancing attention. Axial coding explored categories relationships and found conditions producing actions/interactions and consequences to selective adaptation. The coding paradigm provided the means of analysis of the role contextual (causal conditions), teacher (intervening conditions) and institutional (contextual conditions) factors played in the adaptation strategies and outcomes of these factors. This was through selective coding that incorporated categories around the core category of strategic prioritization within constraints which was what described the central phenomenon that governed the adaptive processes by teachers. During the analysis theoretical memos were used containing insightful analyses, generative and emergent categories, and relationships of analyzes. The use of constant comparative analysis between and within sets of data helped narrow down categories and provided theoretical saturation when not more new properties came. Dialogue Social Science Review (DSSR) www.thedssr.com ISSN Online: 3007-3154 ISSN Print: 3007-3146 Vol. 3 No. 11 (November) (2025) 19 Trustworthiness Trustworthiness was built based on multiple plans such as long-term interaction, triangulation of data sources, member checking among participants, peer debriefing among qualified and professional qualitative researchers, and keeping an audit trail for analytical decision-making. The practices proceeded under the understanding of researcher positionality and possible biases in the research process. Findings It was shown that analysis is quite substantive as it involves a theory of selective adaptation containing five processes that are stimulated and dependent on each other to ensure a successful strategy of teachers to introduce inclusion practices into resourceconstrained environment. The fundamental category, strategic prioritization within constraints refers to decisions made intentionally by teachers regarding what students get a targeted support, what inclusion strategies in practically applicable ways are possible, and how available resources should be distributed to achieve the best inclusion effects. Contextual Assessment: Reading the Environment Teachers were actively resorted to contextual assessment, which is a constant evaluation of their own teaching contexts to learn their possibilities and limitations regarding inclusive practice. This was done through studying class composition, the resources available, institutional support and the attitude of the community toward the inclusion process. The teachers derived an advanced knowledge of their contextual parameters by identifying what was possible under the current circumstances as opposed to aspirational but unattainable under current circumstances. One teacher said: In my class there are 58 students, and three children with apparent learning challenges. I have no time to pay personal attention to all and must first know what is actually open to me here, not what I am supposed to do according to the textbooks at university. Awareness of time limitations also constituted contextual assessment because teachers noted that schedule of curriculum of activities that demanded motions to complete specified syllabi within a specified time did not permit differentiated instruction. Physical set ups that included the classroom size, classroom set up, classroom lighting and access to the classroom also played a role in the perception among teachers on how the accommodations would be possible. Administrative assistance, collaboration firm with colleagues, and involvement with parents were all examples of institutional influences upon the capacity of adaptive strategies that teachers could employ. Hierarchical Prioritization: Triaging Student Needs With the impossibility to support all the diverse learners at the same time and offer individualized support, teachers established prioritization systems of various degrees that became the determiners of which students would be assigned the specific attention and resources. The methodology included analyzing the need severity, intervention success probability, and what overall learning end results might be. The teachers always placed priority to students whose disabilities were obvious and severely disabled and those whose problems posed serious interferences to the school operation. According to one teacher, the deaf kid needs to be given precedence over the slow learner kid since without assistance to the deaf kid, he will not learn anything at all. Such utilitarian rationality articulates the seeks of educators to generate the most accommodative difference in limitations. Dialogue Social Science Review (DSSR) www.thedssr.com ISSN Online: 3007-3154 ISSN Print: 3007-3146 Vol. 3 No. 11 (November) (2025) 20 Prioritization, however, resulted in tensions as teachers reflected that students with less obvious needs like the ones involving learning difficulties, simple behavioral issues or even a psychosocial condition in case were not over-serviced but were progressing badly. These exclusions of morals took their toll at the psychological level of the teacher as they witnessed the gap between the theory of inclusiveness and the limited life. Hierarchical prioritization was a pragmatic coping strategy, thereby that allowed its partial inclusion and provided ethical dissonances concerning fair access. Strategic Simplification: Adapting Complex Pedagogies Teachers are involved in strategic simplification, decreasing the scope of pedagogy of inclusive instructional strategies to apply the primary components in limited environments. Instead of giving up on the concept of inclusion, teachers have found crucial aspects of inclusive practices that still seemed feasible and eliminated the ones that were non-pragmatic. Typically involving big preparation of differentiated materials and activities, differentiated instruction was reduced to two-tier ones, the standard guidance of the majority students and modified assistance to prioritized learners with substantial requirements. The multi-level differentiation promoted in training sessions was hardly employed by teachers who found it difficult to manage and assumed it with large classes with minimal or no preparation time. This reason was given by one teacher: “We were given three types of worksheets preparation for each lesson. I have my own classes with a population of 60 students in five lessons every day. I cannot make up 15 worksheets a day and attend to my house and children.” Inclusiveness in learned through collaborative learning upon which peer support would be offered was scaled down to basic pair work instead of an elaborate system of cooperative learning. Students of lower ability were placed with the brighter students and the teacher used peer support as one of the efficient tools of support based on this concept. This strategy, however, according to the teachers, marginalized the advanced learners in some cases because they would just be teaching assistants who would not get paid. Modification of assessment was minimized to oral questioning of students as opposed to coming up with fully developed assessment forms. Informal observation and interaction between teachers result in the creation of efficient evaluation processes that are less rigorous than normative assessment documentation. Creative Improvisation: Maximizing Limited Resources The creativity of teachers chose to come up with innovative resource-based inclusive supports out of existing resources and social resources even without proper planning due to the dire resource situations. This spontaneous ability manifested some devotion of teachers to inclusion regardless of systemic inability to offer needed infrastructure and material. To support a learner who experiences a problem with comprehension, teachers made inexpensive visuals, due to which they used cardboard, markers, and a lag. The sitting arrangements were taken up properly, getting the students with hearing or vision disability seated in an optimal position, which managed to counteract the lack of assistive technologies. The teacher talked of setting up a sensory space, a kind of quiet corner home furnishing a bookshelf used as a makeshift quiet corner and filling up with cushions, which offered a student with behavioral issues sensory breaks. Dialogue Social Science Review (DSSR) www.thedssr.com ISSN Online: 3007-3154 ISSN Print: 3007-3146 Vol. 3 No. 11 (November) (2025) 21 The ability of teachers to offer personalized attention was facilitated by social resources especially through recruitment of assistance of high performing students, parents and others in the community. Teachers arranged informally when students of tutoring sessions occurred either during the school sessions or during the breaks, with the older students or volunteers working with the struggling students. Sometimes the community members, having the associated expertise were hired like retired teachers, educated parents to assist them with supplementary support. Nevertheless, there was a limit to creative improvisation and sustainability. The improvised solutions could be in the meantime intermittent and not dealing with formal institutional backing but with individual teacher agency. The educators complained they were not being rewarded or encouraged by administration regarding innovations because they did not view inclusion as a shared responsibility and stressed that they were still required to include students on their own and not as an institutional duty. Negotiation Expectations: dealing with several parties Teachers maintained a state of continuous negotiation with various stakeholders, such as the administration, parents, other teachers, and students, to establish a viable situation in which inclusive practice is done effectively. Managing expectations, pushing resources, gaining knowledge of the needs of different learners, and administrating pressures hindering inclusion were the process of managing negotiation. While resorting to inclusive practices, administrators tended to favor examination results and control over classes, making them collide with the push and pull of strategic communication and selective compliance by the teachers. The inclusion dimension in the perspectives of teachers was balloted as having positive impacts on overall learning outcomes but silently opposed the dictates to the effect of allowing vulnerable learners to be left out. One of the teachers explained how she persuaded her principal to allow one student who has behavioral issues to remain with the school by showing that he is making clear progress and has moral responsibility to all children. The attitudes of parents played a great role in implementation of inclusion processes as there is stigmatization of disability and difference thus leading to opposition to inclusive classrooms. Educational theories helped teachers to spend considerable amounts of time teaching parents about the rights and abilities of various learners, involved in misperception dispelling, and establishing tolerance among the school population. Nonetheless, this advocacy job was mostly unrecognized and unpaid, and it was only an extra burden to teachers. Teacher collaboration with colleagues also showed a wide range of differences and some of these teachers encountered supportive colleagues in the collaboration of strategies and sharing resources whereas some of them met with indifference or resistance by colleagues which were not willing to adapt to the diverse learners. Creation of collegial support entails cumulative provision of relationships and shows the viability and utility of inclusion. Discussion The results of this study help uncover how teachers in parts of the world with limited resources generate professional agency by selectively adapting to create context promulgating inclusive practices engaged in dealing with policy imperatives and material realities. The substantive theory that arises out of this study can further enlighten the body of knowledge of inclusion implementation that has framed it and has followed on success/failure models, rather than be more sensitive in the appraisal of how teachers are Dialogue Social Science Review (DSSR) www.thedssr.com ISSN Online: 3007-3154 ISSN Print: 3007-3146 Vol. 3 No. 11 (November) (2025) 22 implementing inclusion in the strategic manners and within the systemic limitations. Theoretical Contributions Selective adaptation and constraints are a theory, which brings interests to the study of inclusive education using the formulation of the mechanisms by which teachers convert global models of inclusion into local practice options. Instead of the deficit perspectives, in which constrained-context inclusion is calculated, to imply insufficiently or unproductively executed application, the present theory views that adaptive expertise invoked by the teachers plays a complicated professional comprehension and must be awarded theoretical dignity and operational support. Such idea as prioritizing strategies is opposite to the discussion of equal inclusions with the definition of all and every learner being able to receive the same flavour of custom attention at the same time. Although it may be philosophically humiliating to admit them, the recognition of the existence of prioritization helps in the real analysis of the issue of resource contribution to enhancement of the incorporation of access and results. This knowledge will play a pivotal role in policy making and facilities that help in addressing rather than ignoring limitations. The findings would be applicable to the literature on teacher agency since they demonstrate how structural constraints block and facilitate agency simultaneously. Adaptive strategies of teachers represent a creative response to bad systems and a scenario that assists in adapting to failure of systems. This phenomenal feature of adapting, becoming stronger alongside as well as being constrained, makes celebratory accounts of teacher innovation difficult, and avoids deterministic accounts that dismiss teacher agency. Implications for Policy and Practice The consequences of such findings are significant to the inclusive policy in Pakistan and elsewhere. Policies must move beyond aspirational rhetoric structures that identify resources and provide certain assistance of adaptive work of teachers. This introduces the elements of reducing the sizes of the classes to manageable levels, sufficient pre-service training and training on in-service education, the easy access of the infrastructure, and the formulation of low-cost inclusive teaching substance to relatively tight restricted spaces. There is need to overhaul teacher education courses to ensure that teachers are prepared to be selectively adapted instead of being prepared to act in an ideal condition inclusively. It is also entailed with learning the ideas of contextual assessment, ethical prioritization decision making, improvisational creativity and negotiating along with stakeholders. Real life experiences used in areas with limited resources should be considered in pre-service preparation, not merely displaying examples of inclusion in the well-resourced demonstration schools. It is essential that professional development should confirm and enhance current adaptive strategies used by teachers and close the number of external frameworks that simply lack attachment to realities. Groups of professionals or learning communities with interprofessional learning among teachers were potential locations that might implement collective wisdom and lessen the burden of improvisation in individual teachers. Limitations and Future Research The scope of this work on Punjab province restricts its applicability to other parts of Pakistan or other countries that may have varied cultural, linguistic, and organizational Dialogue Social Science Review (DSSR) www.thedssr.com ISSN Online: 3007-3154 ISSN Print: 3007-3146 Vol. 3 No. 11 (November) (2025) 23 peculiarities. Future studies could pursue study of selective adaptation within the different Pakistani contexts and opportunities should be made to use comparative research studies of what other developing nations do in regard to the process of adaptation. The four months’ time span of the study described activities, longitudinal research may also look at the ways the approaches that teachers use change throughout their career line and how they adapt to the successive conditions. Another view that considers the performance of the students with varying strategies of adaptation would indicate the level of effectiveness of the methods. Such inclusion should also be studied in the future through the perspective of students and families in constrained settings and the impact of selective adaptation on their experiences and school progression, as well. Knowing about the perception of the nonteacher stakeholders will provide a more comprehensive understanding of the complexity of inclusion in the resources-limited areas. Conclusion This grounded theory project demonstrates inclusive education in resource limited situations by altering the selective adaptation by the teachers that creates strategic processes of prioritization, simplification, improvisation, and negotiation to allow partial inclusion within the framework of systems. Alternatively, to consider adaptation as a failure to meet the ideals of inclusion this study identifies it as advanced professional practice that needs to be supported and nurtured. The way which they work to promote inclusion by Pakistani primary school teachers is incredible as they do not possess sufficient resources, but still, their contributions are also limited by structural constraints featuring systemic instead of unilateral solutions. The inclusion scholarship and policy must in the future pay attention to the constraints of the resources and continue to believe in the equity of education and find contextually interesting policies that do not burden the teacher on these perceptional difficult periods. The concept of selective adaptation, precisely applied and supported, does not imply the rejection of an ethos of inclusion; quite to the contrary, it provides a pragmatic mechanism of achieving it in a situation where fundamental change is still too far off, although equity considerations have pressing demands. References Ahsan, M. T., & Burnip, L. (2007). Inclusive education in Bangladesh. Australasian Journal of Special Education, 31(1), 59–71. https://doi.org/10.1017/S1030011200025598 Anis, F., Waqar, Y., & Muhammad, Y. (2025). Understanding Pakistani elementary school teachers' attitudes toward inclusive education: Development of the teacher inclusion attitude questionnaire. 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