Embracing Learner Variability
Just as no two fingerprints are alike, no two students will learn in exactly the same way. Far too many curricula are designed around a presumption of how the average student learns even though we know there is no average student. Learner variability in our classrooms is the norm. Every student has unique learning needs, and when a curriculum doesn’t recognize this learner variability, it locks many students out of the opportunity to build knowledge.
That’s why it’s so important that the Universal Design for Learning (UDL) drives the creation of curriculum. UDL ensures that a curriculum isn’t designed for an average student but instead provides flexible options that proactively address learning barriers by designing with learner variability in mind. Learner variance is the norm, not the exception, and educators need a curriculum written to support that reality.
How Do All Students Benefit from UDL?
By incorporating the UDL principles of Engagement, Representation, and Action and Expression into a math curriculum, we take the first step in unlocking every student’s potential by giving every student the opportunity to build knowledge.
These principles for UDL detail specific approaches to support students who might need learning accommodations. A curriculum that incorporates the UDL approach to teaching provides all students with an opportunity to succeed by proactively removing learning barriers.
Let’s look outside the classroom for an example of the benefits of UDL in your own world. Say you’re in a crowded restaurant or an airport with a television, and the background noise is too loud for you to hear the audio. With a clear view of the television, you can keep up with the program by reading the closed captions. Closed-captioning wasn’t created for this purpose— it was designed to make television content accessible to viewers who are deaf or hard of hearing. But the accommodation that closed-captioning offers them can help other viewers as well.
The three principles of UDL provide the same access to learning that closed-captioning provides to television viewing. The access is necessary for some learners; for others it’s another entry point that may work best for them in a specific context.
Reducing Barriers to Learning
While the first word in UDL is universal, it’s important to note that the approach is anything but one size fits all. The goal is to create a flexible learning environment that meets varying learning needs. So how does an educator approach teaching with the UDL principles in mind?
The first step is to clarify the goal of the lesson and then to consider what barriers might prevent students from achieving it. Instead of planning a lesson and then adapting it as individual students need support, lessons are designed to anticipate learner variability from the outset. That advance work shifts the learning environment from one focused on whole-class instruction to one that is flexible and adjusts to meet every student’s needs.
How Can UDL Principles Bring Learning to Life
The Engagement principle for UDL is centered on looking for ways to motivate and engage learners by providing them with choices, giving them assignments relevant to their lives, and arranging for students to manage their own learning through goal setting, self-assessment, and reflection.
Gone are the days when the ideal classroom was defined by quiet students sitting at desks while a teacher lectures at the front. A math curriculum should engage students by connecting content to their interests, and those interests can and should be brought into a math lesson. Adjusting questions to make them more meaningful to students provides options for recruiting interest by personalizing and contextualizing the content to learners’ lives.
The Representation principle for UDL is designed to guide educators to offer information in multiple formats, including video and audio, and through hands-on learning. Math students should have an opportunity to engage in math through text, manipulatives, art, video, and digital interactives. Within lessons, students should be able to view data in charts or, given the opportunity, to utilize a graphic organizer to understand key ideas and relationships.
The Action and Expression UDL principle supports giving learners more than one way to interact with the material and to demonstrate what they know. In the lower grades, students may participate in fluency activities that incorporate playing cards, dice, or math manipulatives with students working in groups to show the knowledge they are building. Students with less-developed fine motor skills might be given a chance to use manipulatives to represent an array rather than to draw one on paper. For older students, it may mean using a digital tool to show what they know in a flexible and nontraditional way.
Building Knowledge, Shaping Futures
Classrooms using curricula based on UDL principles will look and sound very different from a traditional classroom. In classrooms using Great Minds curricula, the teacher facilitates the learning, but students own it. Giving up that control of the flow of a lesson as the lecturer in front of the class can be scary, but the payoff is that students learn how to take control in a supportive setting. And rigorous curricula provide students with opportunities for productive struggle, forging a resilient mindset that prepares them for the challenges they’ll face outside the classroom.
At Great Minds, we believe that knowledge-building curricula unlock the greatness in every student. We honor students’ curiosity by providing opportunities for them to make sense of the world around them and to build knowledge through rich content that is designed to meet every learner’s needs.
