Distance learning – thoughts on inclusive design.

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before-you-press-send-_-chrissie-butler

We are in the transition period between “Learning at home” and returning to our education settings. It’s messy and we’re managing change across multiple contexts daily. One probable constant is that blended teaching approaches, combining distance and in-person learning will be the new normal for a while.

This post:

  • highlights some of the practices that can help us inclusively design distance learning options
  • draws attention to approaches that can create barriers to learning and ways to minimise them.

Learning from our own experiences

Let’s begin by considering our own distance learning experiences and reflect on what we value in an online environment.

Most of us have probably had a distance learning experience in our teaching career. We’ve taken a course, attended a webinar or participated in post graduate study where we’ve had to navigate Moodle’s multiple spaces, participate in discussion forums and submit work in unfamiliar formats.

Reviewing our experience of distance learning as adults, we’d probably give quite mixed feedback.

Some of us will have relished open-ended assignments, others will have ached for structure and exemplars. Some of us will have been comfortable posting into an online forum, others will have rewritten a reply to a post ten times before daring to press send.

As we participated in online learning, our home contexts will have impacted on our study. We may have juggled care of children, work pressure, a health crisis within our whānau and/or our own mental health. Most of the time we will have managed the juggle, but sometimes we may have had to step back from the study, negotiate extensions or have a heart-to-heart with a tutor.

Now consider your ongoing use of familiar online environments, such as TradeMe, Facebook, Netflix, or an online supermarket or newspaper website:

  • What do you value in an online environment you use regularly?
  • What kinds of things put you off using a website?

Also reflect on your experience of being part of a teaching team during lock down:

  • What kinds of communication approaches worked well for you?
  • What approaches or tools have you found useful?
  • What was frustrating or tiring?

Designing for humans

If you’re a designer of a distance learning experience, you know that the humans you are planning for will vary in:

  • how they are engaged (what captures their attention, keeps them interested and motivated and maintains their wairua)
  • how they process, make sense of and use information
  • the ways they communicate, collaborate, create and express their thinking.

Planning for this level of variability is an art and also the bread and butter of teaching. As we plan for young humans in distance learning contexts, many of the approaches we use face-to face translate easily (if taking a universal design approach is already part of our practice). There are, however, some additional thoughts worth considering to ensure what we are offering will work for all our learners.

So, to support you in your review of your distance learning options so far, here are:

  • two guiding thoughts
  • a table of practical considerations
  • a learning conversation (a video of Chrissie Butler interviewing Linda Ojala about using a UDL lens to review a lesson or activity).

Guiding thoughts

Learning support is for everyone

learning-support-is-for-everyone-_-chrissie-butler

In the context of designing online learning environments, I’d recommend we think of learning support like air or water or food, it’s a necessity and a human right.

If we turn the words around and call it “support for learning”, we can see that it’s something for everyone.

As experienced kaiako, we know every young human learns differently and learning from home looks and feels different for everyone. We also know that emotion and learning are interconnected (Boekaerts, 2010) and our COVID 19 context and its consequences are having an impact on our individual and collective wellbeing and mental health. We appreciate being able to reach for the support or tools we need, when we need them, be they a pair of scissors, a how-to-video or someone to talk to.

So let’s:

  • build supports, including useful tools, into the way we design our online offerings and make them available to everyone
  • have ongoing conversations with our support staff, teacher aides, deans, whānau leads, guidance counsellors, SENCOs, RTLB, Learning Support Coordinators, specialist colleagues and allow their insights to influence what we design
  • create spaces and opportunities where those who work closely with tamariki can maintain connection
  • seek regular and ongoing feedback from tamariki and whānau regarding what helps and what gets in the way of learning.

Walk in the shoes of your learners

Before you press send, take a walk in the shoes of your learners. Imagine being on the other end of your activities or assignments. What will be your learners’ first impressions?

Will each learner think:

  • Cool, I can connect to these activities, see why they are important and they are doable.
  • Yay, the instructions are presented clearly in video, text and image. With no waffle!!!!!
  • Great, I have options and the teacher has included everything I need to be able to get started.

Inclusive design considerations

Here are some considerations aligned to the three principles of the Universal Design for Learning (UDL) framework. You can find out more about each principle by following the link in the left hand column.

Focus area Things to think about Benefits for learners
ENGAGEMENT
Supporting engagement		 Communicate in ways that engage culture, are mana enhancing and build community.
  • See themselves in the context/feel valued.
  • Fosters ongoing social connections and friendships.
Agree with students the different ways and times they can connect with you.
  • Clear shared expectations promote feelings of safety.
  • Choosing options gives agency and autonomy.
  • Can match the medium to preferences, needs and the constraints of their home context.
Make explicit the purpose of each activity or selection of activities.
  • Know what they are learning and why.
  • Motivating.
  • Can quickly decide if the activity has relevance to achieving own learning goals.
Offer learning activities where students can connect interests and experiences.
  • Relevant and personal.
  • Increases student motivation.
  • Can use props, equipment and items of personal value from their own environments.
Avoid “must do’s” and offer a range of can do’s.
  • Agency to decide what activities they can do within their own context.
  • Reduces unnecessary angst.
REPRESENTATION
Support access and understanding of information and instructions		 Keep the organisation of your online space laid out in a logical predictable way.
  • Makes navigation easier.
  • Can predict where they will find things.
  • Reduces frustration.
Support short video instructions with separate written instructions. 
  • Provides an overview of the content.
  • Key content can be easily rewound.
  • Increases accessibility.
Avoid burying instructions in your daily hello video.
  • Instruction for activities can be found with the activity.
  • Can just focus on connection with you, rather than having to split attention.
ACTION and EXPRESSION
Supporting communication, action and expression		 Position supports next to each activity so they can be easily accessed.
  • Supports attention and concentration.
  • Supports independence. 
Offer multiple ways to fulfil a goal, including an option to choose their own approach.
  • Can successfully show what they know in a way that works for them.
  • Have agency over materials and learning tools.
Make activities with increasing levels of complexity available to everyone.
  • Can move between levels of complexity to match how they are feeling and who they have access to as collaborators.
  • Not limited by teacher expectations.

A learning conversation

The video below introduces how we can review a lesson or activity with a UDL lens using the UDL thinking cycle. It is an informal interview between myself and colleague Linda Ojala. It is 14 minutes long.


Downloads

how-can-we-learn-the-same-thing-differently-image-aroha-harrisSummary

Over the last couple of months, the learning curve has been immense as we have adjusted to teaching and learning over distance.

Hopefully this learning curve will continue to expand as together with whānau and tamariki we seek feedback, discuss and reflect on:

  • practices and ways of working we want to keep from our learning at home experience
  • old ways of working we don’t want to repeat or revisit
  • how to innovate a blended approach to teaching and learning that allows and supports every child and their whanau to access, influence and participate in learning experiences and environments that work for them.

I can imagine some of the richest discussions will be around maintaining and supporting learner agency and continuing to support close collaboration with whānau.

I also hope that we can take into the new normal some of our new learning about planning for variability, utlising digital tools and employing creative solutions, to ensure every child has access to learning in a way that works for them.

Finally, all the thoughts shared above translate directly to blended practice. They reflect a people-centred, systematic approach to design and are informed by the framework Universal Design for Learning.

Get in touch if we can help in any way or you would like to learn more about Universal Design for Learning, web accessibility and inclusive design principles and practices.

Acknowledgements

  • Vonnie Jones for uttering the phrase “before you press send”.
  • Linda Ojala for the interview and constant collaboration and innovation.
  • The UDL and inclusive design team at CORE.
  • The Aroha Harris quote can be found in the introduction to Anderson, A. (2016). The First Migration Māori Origins 3000BC – AD1450. Bridget Williams Books Ltd. 
  • Boekaerts, M. (2010). Chapter 4: The crucial role of motivation and emotion in classroom learning. In H. Dumont, D. Istance & F. Benavides, The Nature of Learning: Using Research to Inspire Practice. OECD Publishing. Retrieved 12 May 2020, from https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/education/the-nature-of-learning_9789264086487-en.
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Why UDL is valuable

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“Without a systematic way to interrupt current practice in the classroom the impact of these barriers is repeatedly faced by each generation without significant forward motion to break the cycle once & for all.”

Bae, S., Ofiesh, N. S., Blackorby, J. (2018)

UDL quote

@chrissiebutler CORE Education CC BY NC 4.0

Enables equity in education

“Providing high quality education is a matter of social justice” (Ministry of Education, 2019). As teachers and leaders our bottom line is that no-one will be left out or discriminated against. As everyone learns differently, finding ways to create flexible, barrier-free learning environments is of critical importance if all students are to thrive (ibid.)

Universal Design for Learning (UDL) can help us in this work. It gives us a framework to design learning environments that are “flexible, and where barriers to learning can be identified and removed at the outset (Ministry of Education, 2019). It can help us towards equitable access and participation in education.

A culturally inclusive framework

Although UDL was conceived in US, it has value for us here in Aotearoa because it takes “a people-first approach to planning learning” (Ministry of Education, 2019). UDL invites us to think about “WHO we will teach and what those learners bring with them BEFORE we think about WHAT we will teach” (ibid.)

“UDL is focused on ensuring all learners get a chance to learn in ways that work for them. It is about removing barriers and opening doors to learning. It is driven not only by the findings from neuroscience and educational research but by a vision for equity” (Ministry of Education, 2019).

universal-design-for-learning-udl-in-aotearoa

@chrissiebutler CORE Education CC BY NC 4.0

Everyone benefits

When UDL is implemented intentionally across a community it can bring coherence to teaching practices that are inclusive of all learners. This approach benefits everyone.

Students can be confident they will have:

  • equitable access to learning opportunities
  • the tools and supports they need to demonstrate their learning in ways that work for them across all classes
  • responsive teachers who welcome their self-advocacy and seek feedback on their teaching
  • knowledgeable teachers who value and have an understanding of learner variability.

Whānau can trust that:

  • their ideas and questions will be welcomed
  • the uniqueness of their child will be valued and seen as a source of strength for the community
  • their child will be taught in a way that works for them and their learning needs will be met
  • their child will not be singled out or separated from their peers.

Teachers have a framework to guide decision-making. It supports them to:

  • identify and minimise barriers to learning and wellbeing hidden in their teaching
  • consider how to offer useful options and supports that can be built into the learning environment at the outset
  • problem solve with colleagues, students and whānau using the shared language of UDL.

Leaders have a framework that will:

  • help them support the presence and participation of every learner (child to adult) and ensure their rights as a learners are upheld and protected
  • support consistent, coherent inclusive teaching and learning practices across their school
  • set expectations around “what inclusive can look like”
  • guide the design of more inclusive systems and processes, staff hui, community events and building projects
  • provide a shared language that can be used with all stakeholders, across all contexts.

Find out more:

Acknowledgements

Bae, S., Ofiesh, N. S., Blackorby, J. (2018) A Commitment to Equity: The Design of the UDL Innovation Studio at the Schwab Learning Center

Marotta, M. (2018) Tips, Tricks and Tools to Build Your Inclusive Classroom Through UDL

Ministry of Education (2019) UDL guide, Inclusive Education website

Illustrations by @chrissiebutler CORE Education CC BY NC 4.0

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level up

Level up your inclusive practice

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level up
Here’s a loose attempt to apply a gaming analogy to valuing and planning for diversity in your learning community.

Level 1 star: Planning for the predictable

Imagine this scenario:

  • You have been asked at short notice to prepare lunch for 20 people
  • You don’t have an opportunity to find out about preferences/allergies
  • You are directed to go to the local supermarket (with the work credit card) to “Get something for lunch”.

Chances are you wouldn’t buy $150 of mince and cheese pies. Instead, you would probably run this little narrative in your head, “Hmm, I bet someone is vegetarian, maybe gluten-free or even dairy free, better get a range of stuff then people can choose what they want”.

That’s planning for the predictable.

We expect people to have different preferences and needs, so we plan for them. We want everyone to eat, to feel welcome. It’s about courtesy. We definitely don’t want anyone to feel excluded.

In any teaching context, the above scenario translates pretty well. As teachers or facilitators, we find ourselves in situations where we have to prepare an environment for learners we don’t know personally.

What guides planning in this context? What might be the predictable needs or preferences in a learning environment? How do you demonstrate courtesy or practise manaakitanga?

Maybe you think about:

  • The people: who they could be, what they may bring, what may be important for them
  • The tikanga you will use
  • Potential barriers hidden in the design of the environment or activities that could hinder participation and learning
  • Options and supports that can be offered to everyone

Summary: Level one is about expecting, valuing, and planning for that diversity from the outset.

Level 2 starstar: Valuing the personal

Scenario two: Kai for a friend’s birthday.
If I invite a friend over for her birthday and I know she loves strawberries, I’ll probably offer strawberries as an option for dessert. It’s a small ordinary thing: something most of us do.

When I am facilitating, and I know that there are a bunch of people in the room who love walking in the mountains, I will try to include analogies and images related to mountains, big vistas, and wild remote places in my storytelling. Again, it’s a small act, motivated by an intention to build connection and support engagement.

Again, the practice connects easily to the classroom:

  • Reflecting knowledge of learners and their histories/experiences/context in the learning design
  • Offering everyone options and supports inspired by the needs, preferences or interests of individual learners

Summary: Level 2 is really about getting to know people personally and using that knowledge to refine the learning design.

Level 3 starstarstar: Getting strategic

Adopting Level 1 and 2 practices will probably improve the usefulness of most learning environments. The downside? These approaches can be a bit random, e.g., when learners move between classes they can experience very different levels of access, options, and support.

So, what can help us establish:

  • shared foundational approaches to ensure learners get a more consistent deal as they move from class to class, course to course, school to school?
  • common language to support our practice and conversations with students, whānau, and each other?

Universal Design for Learning (UDL) is the approach I wholeheartedly recommend schools, kura, and learning organisations investigate. Although UDL originates in the US, we are learning to use it with integrity here in Aotearoa.

UDL is:

  • a strategic approach to inclusive practice
  • endorsed by the Ministry of Education
  • an explicit component of the revised approach to PB4L school-wide approach
  • provides a framework for effective use of technologies
  • applicable to all aspects of education (systems and processes, professional learning design, community partnerships, the design of physical environments, assessment practice, activity and event planning…).

Many of the practices recommended in the UDL framework are already familiar, so we’re not starting from scratch.

The value the UDL framework brings is it helps us:

  • notice aspects of our practice that we hadn’t considered before
  • identify and remove barriers to learning hidden in the way we routinely do things
  • move away from random well-intentioned acts of inclusion
  • supports us to engage actively with diversity and variability
  • guides deliberate coherent innovation in inclusive design.

Summary: Level 3 is about taking a strategic transparent approach to planning for diversity.

Rate your workplace

So, which level best represents your organisation starstarstar?

  • What’s your view and what’s your evidence?
  • What would the students say?

Getting some support to level up

If you are keen to find out more about inclusive practices and Universal Design for Learning:

Image credits
Level-up image: By Diomedes17 – Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=51580060¶

Stars: By CFCF – Own work on Wikimedia, CC0,

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equality, equity, liberation

The catch 22 of targeted support

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A while ago, I visited a small rural school that had introduced a range of literacy support tools in a systematic way across all of their classes. The school had recognised that much of the content shared and used in their classrooms was in written format and that this was creating a barrier for students.

Soon after implementation, staff were excited to note that one student in particular had started working in class and had answered some questions. The literacy support tools removed a barrier for her, and the success story quickly spread around the staffroom.

equality, equity, liberation
Removing barriers to learning – Liberation representing the concept of Universal Design for Learning, Interaction Institute for Social Change | Artist: Angus Maguire interactioninstitute.org madewithangus.com

One staff member talked to the student in question (let’s call her Jane) about her success using the literacy support tools. Unfortunately, the staff member did not realise that Jane was very sensitive to being singled out and made to feel different from her peers. The small act of talking to her had unintended consequences…. from that moment, Jane stopped using the literacy support tools.

Unintended consequences

This story, while very sad, has reminded me about the way we think of some students as having “additional needs”. We sometimes call them our priority learners; we recognise that they need more help than others to be successful in our classrooms, and we provide targeted resourcing for them.

But, if some students have “additional” needs, does that mean, by implication, that the rest have “normal” levels of need?

The very idea seems flawed when we consider the uniqueness of each and every student. When we embrace diversity, everyone has such a variety of individual learning needs that saying some are “additional” and some are not, no longer makes much sense.

Our traditional approach to supporting students like Jane is to identify their individual needs and provide targeted support. Hence, we design for most of our students and then differentiate or provide adapted resources to meet the “additional” needs of other students.

One of the unintended consequences of this approach is that it tends to focus on the student as the nub of the “problem” and any support they need as “extra” to everyday teaching and learning.

Another unintended consequence is that it can make students feel different or “under the spotlight” — this was the issue for Jane on this particular occasion.

The catch-22 for schools is that we want to continue to provide targeted resources where they are needed but the process of identifying needs requires a focus on identifying a student’s difference from the (illusionary) “norm” of others. Further, the process of identification can result in negative or deficit labelling of students.

That is why Universal Design for Learning resonates for me.

Why Universal Design for Learning (UDL)

He waka eke noa 1
A canoe for one and all 2
If someone is finding learning difficult, UDL asks, what we can do to design teaching and learning that works for everyone rather than what is wrong with the student. UDL aims to cater for a range of students first and foremost by offering flexible and personalised ways to learn rather than focusing on differentiating for the odd “different” student.

Developing strong, trusting relationships and knowing our students well and can help us be aware of how small actions on our part could lead to unintended consequences for our students.

In a recent visit to the school I saw students using a range of literacy support tools in their everyday work. The tools were not used widely but they were a flexible option that could be used when and if the students wanted or needed them.

Just as ramps and accessible toilets aim to make buildings barrier-free environments, the school I visited recently is continuing to identify and remove barriers using the principles of Universal Design for Learning (UDL).


Enabling e-Learning video: BYOD supporting inclusion

If you are interested in hearing more about UDL and Inclusive Design, make an inquiry to CORE Education.

 

1 http://www.maori.cl/Proverbs.htm

2 The use of this whakataukī here is to support the ideals of inclusivity.

Image credits:
Removing barriers to learning – Liberation representing the concept of Universal Design for Learning, Interaction Institute for Social Change by Angus Maguire, interactioninstitute.org madewithangus.com (used by permission).

 

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planning with udl

Universal Design for Learning in curriculum planning and lesson design

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In my last few blogs, I have unpacked UDL principles and UDL thinking. Once people understand the basic principles of UDL they often ask how to use those principles in class and lesson planning.

The quick and easy answer is to consider all your learners, and use the UDL principles throughout every aspect of the design and planning process. But this advice is not always practical enough to be very helpful. In response, Linda Ojala and I have synthesised some earlier work from a variety of sources 1 into a framework to support the planning process.

planning with udl

Download this chart (PDF)

Let’s break this down…

Universal Supports

Does the everyday learning environment provide a range of supports to cater for student variability?

Universal Supports are those things that exist in the learning environment that the teacher does not have to think about or plan for daily, thus saving teachers time and energy.

They are typically supports that are common to several learning activities. Universal Supports include the physical, emotional, and learning environment in the classroom as well as well-established systems and protocols that are so embedded that they are simply ‘the way we do things around here’.

Some examples are:

  • having black pens for your whiteboard rather than green ones that are harder to see
  • daily routines and timetables (and visual displays showing these)
  • having a variety of furniture and spaces to suit different tasks and preferences
  • visuals and posters to support thinking frameworks, problem-solving, task completion etc
  • having digital technologies that students can use to personalise their learning.

Goal or Purpose

Ask: Does everyone know what they are doing and why?
Goals give us direction, so it is important that everyone is clear about the purpose of their learning and what they need to do to achieve success. Articulating goals can be as simple as stating them at the outset of a lesson, or writing them on the board, but should always be expressed in ways that are understood by all.

Group or whole-class goals should allow for student variability so that each student can see how the goal is appropriate for them. Lastly, always make sure that the means of achieving the goal is not confused with the goal itself.

For example, if students are researching content material, the means of doing the task may include reading, but, unless you are purposefully targeting reading, this should not be part of the goal. In this scenario, students who cannot read the material (such as those with dyslexia), can still successfully complete the task by using tools like text-to-speech technology.

How the goal is met should not interfere with achieving the goal of learning that content—just as a GPS doesn’t provide only one route to a destination but may offer alternative routes based on variable factors, such as traffic, non-highway options, and so forth2 .

Teaching approaches and activities

Ask: Will the teaching approaches and options for completing activities work for everyone?
When planning teaching approaches and learning activities, consider if the way you plan to do things will work for each and every student in the class.

For example, the following poster by Richard Wells may make us rethink the effectiveness of whole-class teaching.

the class a teacher talks to

If you know (or think it is likely) at the outset that it won’t work for everyone, ask:

  1. Why are we doing it this way?
  2. Is there another way of approaching the teaching and learning that is more likely to work for everyone?
  3. What extra supports are needed to ensure everyone is successful?

Co-creating with students often provides a powerful alliance as students can identify innovative ways to do things and provide ideas about the things that work for them.

Resources and Materials

Ask: What resources or materials will I need to make it work for everyone?
Supporting resources can help students to know what to do, how to do it and what success looks like.

Resources that support students to undertake the task come in a variety of formats and include:

  1. frameworks that break tasks down into steps
  2. exemplars
  3. visuals to aid comprehension
  4. cheat sheets
  5. word lists
  6. materials or multimedia resources that allow students to learn in a variety of ways.

Ask: Are the resources or materials accessible and usable by everyone?
When designing resources, consider whether they are accessible and usable by all. Worksheets and workbooks are inaccessible for students who need reading support and those who have low vision or who are blind.

By digitising content, students can personalise how they access the material. For example, the text could be read aloud using text-to-speech, enlarged for students who have low vision, or converted to Braille.

Assessment and outputs

Ask: Can the students show what they know in a way that works for them?
For some students, assessments in specific formats or under certain conditions may not provide a good gauge of their learning. A strengths-based approach with flexible assessment conditions can more accurately assess student learning.

For example, if we ask a student who has difficulty using a pen to write to show their learning and comprehension, we may learn very little about their learning and a lot about their writing ability — something it is likely we already knew.

Flexible assessments options can be achieved by:

  1. using a range of formats for evidence of learning (e.g. audio, video, and a variety of multimedia options)
  2. identifying barriers for students, and providing tools such as text-to-speech, voice typing and other reader/writer options to overcome these
  3. provide flexible timing, scheduling, and accommodations to gain the best evidence of learning.

Final word

We hope this framework helps you apply UDL principles in a class or lesson-planning context. In the end, it is really about having that important question at the heart of everything you do: Will it work for everyone?

 

Resources and further information about UDL:

 

1 Including work from CAST, Chrissie Butler, and this article by David Gordon

2 How UDL can get you to personalized learning, eSchool News, David Gordon (CAST).

Image “The class a teacher talks to”, by Richard Wells @EduWells More @Eduwells.com under Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License.

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