Just Teach to the Kids!

This video helps us to see how Universal Design of Learning can be applied in the classroom. An overview of UDL is given, as well as teachers and administrators giving first hand accounts of using UDL. Students also talk about some of the ways they are learning in the classroom. I feel that this video also asks some of the important questions that are related to Universal Design. “What is it that we can do for that student to be successful in class? Do we need to tailor the lesson, the assessment, or what is learned for them? Are they movers? Are they verbal thinkers? Are they visual thinkers?”

“You just gotta teach to that kid.”

https://youtu.be/I92QkPdvYRI

Implementation of UDL Strategies

This is a resource provided by The Ohio State University (grrrr, a big rivalry of Penn State, but I’ll allow this reference because it’s a good one). The picture below shows ways in which we can implement UDL into our daily lesson plans. The given strategies touch on each of the three principles of Universal Design: means of representation, means of expression, and means of engagement. The words in bold in each strategy are what we need to pay attention to most as well as utilize more often in each of our lessons. Now realistically it will be hard to put so many strategies into our lessons, and we really don’t want to over stimulate or give our students so much at once that they are thinking in too many directions, but utilizing a few of these in each day will absolutely make a difference!

Implement these strategies to help your students become expert learners!

http://ada.osu.edu/resources/fastfacts/Universal-Design-FF.pdf