Universal Design for Learning: Supporting College Inclusion for Students With Intellectual Disabilities

2017 ◽  
Vol 42 (2) ◽  
pp. 122-127 ◽  
Author(s):  
Matthew L. Love ◽  
Joshua N. Baker ◽  
Stephanie Devine
Keyword(s):  
Postsecondary Education ◽  
Universal Design ◽  
Planning Process ◽  
Transition Planning ◽  
Universal Design For Learning ◽  
Instructional Materials ◽  
College Level ◽  
Secondary Educators ◽  
Design For Learning ◽  
Education Opportunity

As college becomes an increasingly important prerequisite for employment, it is important that all students have access to postsecondary education (PSE). The passage of the Higher Education Opportunity Act has provided students with intellectual disability (ID) a pathway to college, though some barriers in this transition still exist. This article is meant to highlight strategies instructors at the postsecondary level can utilize to support the transition and inclusion of students with ID in college-level courses. The role PSE programs play establishing what college readiness for individuals with ID is also discussed. A specific focus will be paid to how the universal design for learning (UDL) framework can be applied to instructional materials to support the inclusion of students with ID in college, and how these strategies can be modeled for secondary educators to support the transition planning process for students with ID.

scholarly journals Reimagining Disability and Inclusive Education Through Universal Design for Learning

2017 ◽  
Vol 37 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Jan Doolittle Wilson
Keyword(s):  
Students With Disabilities ◽  
Inclusive Education ◽  
Universal Design ◽  
Universal Design For Learning ◽  
White Male ◽  
Instructional Materials ◽  
Learning Goals ◽  
Regular Classroom ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Design For Learning

In 1975, Congress enacted a law eventually known as the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA), which ensures that children with disabilities receive a free, appropriate, public education. Since then, scholarly and popular debates about the effectiveness of inclusive education have proliferated and typically focus on the ability or inability of students with disabilities to succeed in so-called regular classrooms. These debates reflect widespread assumptions that the regular classroom is rightly the province of nondisabled students and a neutral, value-free space that students with disabilities invade and disrupt via their very presence and their costly needs for adaptation. But as many scholars in the field of Disability Studies in Education (DSE) have argued, these discussions often fail to recognize that the space of the regular classroom, far from neutral, is constructed for a nondisabled, neurotypical, white, male, middle-class "norm" that neither reflects nor accommodates the wide range of diverse learners within it, regardless of whether these learners have been diagnosed with a disability. A DSE perspective sees the educational environment, not students with disabilities, as the "problem" and calls for a Universal Design for Learning approach to education, or the design of instructional materials and activities that allows the learning goals to be achievable by individuals with wide differences in their abilities and backgrounds. Agreeing with this DSE perspective, this article uses an autoethnographic approach to reexamine inclusive education and to consider how university classrooms, pedagogy, and curricular materials can be improved in order to accommodate all students, not just those with disabilities. Ultimately, the article argues that Universal Design for Learning has the potential to radically transform the meaning of inclusive education and the very concept of disability.

Achieving the Transformational Vision for Universal Design for Learning: Guest Associate Editor Introduction

2020 ◽  
Vol 56 (3) ◽  
pp. 177-178
Author(s):  
Dave Edyburn
Keyword(s):  
Teacher Educators ◽  
Universal Design ◽  
Universal Design For Learning ◽  
Associate Editor ◽  
Instructional Materials ◽  
Instructional Designers ◽  
Policy Makers ◽  
The Past ◽  
Design For Learning ◽  
The Relationship

The potential of Universal Design for Learning (UDL) has captured the imagination of policy makers, educators, administrators, teacher educators, as well as educational researchers. Over the past 20 years, there has been increasing interest in how the vision of UDL could be translated into practice. And yet, there is little agreement about whether or not UDL is a design intervention and therefore the responsibility of publishers and instructional designers as they create curricula and instructional materials. I am pleased to introduce this guest column that profiles the work of Drs. Matthew Marino and Eleazar Vasquez as they describe the relationship between executive functioning and learner variability in inclusive classrooms.

scholarly journals Using Universal Design for Learning to Design Standards-Based Lessons

SAGE Open ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 6 (4) ◽  
pp. 215824401668068 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kavita Rao ◽  
Grace Meo
Keyword(s):  
Universal Design ◽  
Planning Process ◽  
Special Educators ◽  
Universal Design For Learning ◽  
Lesson Plans ◽  
General Educators ◽  
Academic Standards ◽  
Design Standards ◽  
Academic Standard ◽  
Design For Learning

The Universal Design for Learning (UDL) framework can be used to proactively design lessons that address learner variability. Using UDL guidelines, teachers can integrate flexible options and supports that ensure that standards-based lessons are accessible to a range of learners in their classrooms. This article presents a process that teachers can use as they develop standards-based lesson plans. By “unwrapping” academic standards and applying UDL during the lesson planning process, teachers can identify clear goals aligned with an academic standard and develop flexible methods, assessments, and materials that address the needs and preferences of varied learners. General educators and special educators can use this process to develop inclusive lesson plans that address all learners, with and without disabilities.

scholarly journals Post Secondary educators can increase educational reach with Universal Design for Learning

2017 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 27-36
Author(s):  
Kimberly Coy
Keyword(s):  
Universal Design ◽  
Universal Design For Learning ◽  
Design Stage ◽  
Environment Design ◽  
Barriers To Learning ◽  
Secondary Educators ◽  
Post Secondary ◽  
College And University ◽  
Design For Learning ◽  
Learning Environment Design

Meeting the needs of a variety of learners in college and university settings is of vital importance. By designing courses infused with Universal Design for Learning (UDL) principles, guidelines and checkpoints; professors and instructors create environments targeted toward meeting the educational needs of a wider variety of students. UDL works most effectively at the design stage. This paper aims to support learning environment design by presenting ten specific strategies for infusing UDL within post-secondary courses at the university level. These strategies will include: identifying barriers to learning, alternatives for participating during class time, effective alternative assessments based on construct relevance and UDL meta cognitive goals and transparency.

Implementing a UDL Framework: A Study of Current Personnel Preparation Practices

2017 ◽  
Vol 55 (1) ◽  
pp. 25-36 ◽  
Author(s):  
LaRon A. Scott ◽  
Colleen A. Thoma ◽  
Lauren Puglia ◽  
Peter Temple ◽  
Allison D'Aguilar
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Postsecondary Education ◽  
Universal Design ◽  
Special Educators ◽  
Universal Design For Learning ◽  
Research Practice ◽  
Personnel Preparation ◽  
Postschool Outcomes ◽  
Program Coordinators ◽  
Design For Learning

Abstract Young adults with intellectual disability (ID) continue to experience the least successful postschool outcomes among transition-aged youth (Sanford et al., 2011). Experts disagree on the most effective approach to improve outcomes such as employment, postsecondary education, and community living. In 2015, the National Goals Conference brought together educational researchers to set an agenda to guide the field in terms of research, practice, and policy (Thoma, Cain, & Walther-Thomas, 2015). One of their recommendations, based on promising research and practices, urged the field to identify effective personnel preparation and professional development practices that ensure general and special educators can implement a UDL framework (Thoma, Cain, et al., 2015). This study surveyed program coordinators at accredited universities to determine what is currently being done to prepare educators to implement a Universal Design for Learning (UDL) framework, the extent to which a UDL framework is being incorporated into preservice courses in higher education, and how a UDL framework is being used to improve postschool outcomes for youth with ID.

Using UDL to Plan a Book Study Lesson for Students With Intellectual Disabilities in Inclusive Classrooms

2021 ◽  
pp. 004005992110101
Author(s):  
Laura K. Anderson
Keyword(s):  
General Education ◽  
Intellectual Disabilities ◽  
Universal Design ◽  
Planning Process ◽  
Universal Design For Learning ◽  
Lesson Planning ◽  
Learning Experiences ◽  
Design For Learning ◽  
Students With Intellectual Disabilities ◽  
General Education Classrooms

Students with intellectual disabilities are among the least likely students to spend a significant amount of time in general education classrooms. When they are included, they may spend their time on non-academic learning experiences. Universal Design for Learning is a lesson planning framework that can guide teachers in inclusive lesson planning. This article explores the Universal Design for Learning framework and how teachers can incorporate it into the lesson planning process for a book study in high school English Language Arts. This lesson planning process provides genuine learning experiences to students with intellectual disabilities in the general education classrooms. The article offers examples of how to incorporate multiple means of representation, multiple means of engagement, and multiple means of expression and action within the four steps of the lesson planning process: learning goals, instructional methods, instructional materials, and assessment.

Adapting English as a Foreign Language classes to the needs of students with hearing impairments in early elementary education

2018 ◽  
Vol LXXIX (1) ◽  
pp. 12-20
Author(s):  
Ewa Domagała-Zyśk
Keyword(s):  
Elementary Education ◽  
Foreign Language ◽  
Universal Design ◽  
Universal Design For Learning ◽  
Instructional Materials ◽  
Early Elementary ◽  
Hearing Impairments ◽  
Teaching Resources ◽  
Language Classes ◽  
Design For Learning

Increasingly, deaf and hard-of-hearing students are attending mainstream and integrated schools. It is necessary to provide a number of adaptations, sometimes modifications, of the teacher’s instructional methods and forms for their education to be effective. The purpose of this article is to discuss the issue of adapting English as a Foreign Language classes in early elementary education to the needs of students with hearing impairments. Effective education in this area requires syllabuses, textbooks, and teaching resources that are developed in accordance with the principles of universal design for learning and then necessary adaptations and modifications that are planned on an individual basis following children’s needs and abilities. The author suggests the principles of universal design for learning according to which foreign language instruction for students with hearing impairments should be planned. Due to the internal diversity of this group of students, not only methodological procedures should be individualized but also instructional forms and methods used during English classes as well as the methods of presenting instructional materials by the teacher or other students. In order to optimize the reception and transmission of content, appropriate external conditions that are adapted to individual students’ perceptual and performance abilities need to be provided. Also, the diversity of ways in which students with hearing impairments present their knowledge and thus actively participate in classes is pointed out. Suggesting different adaptations, the author emphasizes the need to take care that instructional materials maintain their full substantive value.

Going Deep: Leveraging Universal Design for Learning to Engage All Learners in Rich Disciplinary Thinking in ELA

2018 ◽  
Vol 120 (3) ◽  
pp. 1-40
Author(s):  
Jenna W. Gravel
Keyword(s):  
Universal Design ◽  
Universal Design For Learning ◽  
Research Question ◽  
Learning Opportunities ◽  
Instructional Materials ◽  
Fifth Grade ◽  
Habits Of Mind ◽  
Urban District ◽  
Development Organization ◽  
Design For Learning

Background Educators and researchers have long emphasized the need to engage students in disciplinary thinking in order to develop rich, discipline-specific practices and habits of mind. Yet, these opportunities are often under-nurtured in today's classrooms and are especially limited for students with disabilities. Universal Design for Learning (UDL) is one promising avenue for supporting all students to engage in disciplinary thinking (ways of knowing, reasoning, and doing specific to the discipline). This framework for teaching and learning suggests embedding options into curricula in order to expand learning opportunities for students with and without disabilities. Researchers have yet to investigate how UDL and disciplinary thinking can complement one another. Research Question This study explores the following question: How, if at all, do teachers working within a school that explicitly promotes the UDL framework use UDL to prompt students’ disciplinary thinking in English Language Arts (ELA)? Setting The study was conducted in a fifth grade classroom of an inclusive elementary school in an urban district in the northeast United States. Participants Participants included two fifth grade co-teachers and their class of 21 students with and without documented disabilities. Research Design This qualitative case study spanned a 10-week ELA unit. Data were gathered via videotaped observations, collection of instructional materials, interviews with the co-teachers, and collection of student work. CAST is a nonprofit education research and development organization that works to expand learning opportunities for all individuals through UDL. The analytic framework joined CAST's UDL Guidelines and common themes distilled from the literature that characterize disciplinary thinking in ELA. This framework was used as a starting place to code the co-teachers’ practice and students’ thinking. An open coding strategy was applied to capture emergent themes. Findings Data reveal that the co-teachers used specific strategies to create opportunities for all students to engage in disciplinary thinking. First, particular UDL guidelines/checkpoints were applied. For example, to support learners in “reading like writers,” the co-teachers applied strategies consistent with Guideline 6: “Provide options for executive functions,” encouraging students to develop the planning and organizational practices of expert readers and writers. Second, particular UDL guidelines/checkpoints were used in ways that are not explicitly suggested in the UDL Guidelines. For example, to support students in “reading for meaning” and “reading like writers,” the co-teachers’ strategies were generally consistent with Guideline 3: “Provide options for comprehension.” Yet, the co-teachers moved beyond “comprehension” by empowering students to construct their own sophisticated, disciplinary analyses. Conclusions The co-teachers’ instructional moves and the richness of students’ thinking offer important implications for future iterations of the UDL Guidelines and suggest that all learners can and should be challenged to engage in discipline-specific practices and habits of mind.

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