UDL in Distance Learning: Meeting Each Learner’s Variability Webinar

This webinar by edWeb.net was full of great ideas, tips, and resources supporting all learners learning from home. This webinar also had excellent ideas for supporting all learners in collaboration and working online in a 1:1 classroom. 

What is learner variability? 

A recognition that all learners differ and that learning sciences research guide us in understanding how these differences matter for learning.

It considers the whole child.

In the video Research@Work: Embracing Learner Variability in Schools, David Rose discusses the importance of providing learning supports and structures tailored to students’ individual needs and abilities. He shares his vision for “de-standardising” education to help students discover their strengths and become expert learners.

Teachers need to understand how I learn, not how the average student learns, which our new National Education and Learning Priorities focus on, particularly Learners at the Centre and Barrier Free Access.

What do we mean when we say engagement?

Student engagement is made up of Emotional and Relational, Cognitive and Behavioural which I have blogged about previously in Wellbeing Won't Cut It Alone!.

The Learner Variability Navigator: A Whole Child Framework

A great framework is The Learner Variability Navigator, which helps us understand learner variability and then recognise learning challenges become a design opportunity rather than a student problem. 

First, you choose the area of interest of either math, reading, literacy or adult learning. Then you explore the factors that may create barriers to the learning for example in Literacy 4-6 Examples are Literacy, Cognition, Social and Emotional Learning and Student Background.

 If you know Syntax is a barrier by clicking on it unpacks the factor.

Once you understand the factor, you click on Strategies, and the framework has various research-based strategies for the factor.

The framework is not specifically for New Zealand; however, I see value in this, especially for teacher PLG's as part of an inquiry to include in the Learn if they are looking for new strategies to support learners and the connections between the factors.

The framework also supports teachers of learners with Autism, ADHD, Dyslexia, Deaf/Hard of Hearing by identifying what strategies would support.

If Universal Design for Learning is new to you or you wish to inquire further into it Smita Worah a professional development consultant from SERC has created this Padlet - Introduction to Universal Design for Learning

The following notes come directly from the slideshow today and are the work of the educators below and others. Even though this is talking about distance learning there are strong links to online learning when using Google Sites as part of classroom practice.

Distance learning: 6 UDL best practices for online learning

Examining Barriers to Find Solutions Summary (click the link above to unpack each point)

1. Explicitly teach expectations and engagement. 
2. Allow for asynchronous learning. 
3. Assign note-takers or provide guided notes with a summary of key ideas.
4. Make materials accessible. 
5. Embrace your students as teachers.
6. Actively build a supportive community.

Watching a lesson via video rather than experiencing it in the classroom can make it difficult for students to: 

• focus
• feel connected 
• process information 
• identify key ideas

Live Video Lessons: 5 Ways Kids Struggle and How to Help

Video is a challenging medium of learning for many students. Students have varied skills and

comfort levels with technology for distance learning.

Examining Barriers to Find Solutions Summary (click the link above to unpack each point)

1. Feeling Anxious About Being on Camera 
2. Staying Focused
3. Keeping Up With the Lesson
4. Managing Sensory Information 
5. Remembering Key Points

UDL solution: Explicitly teach expectations and engagement

• Co-create expectations with students.
• Teach and provide opportunities for practice
• Use multiple formats for sharing and referencing expectations. 
• Some students have trouble processing information only in auditory form.

UDL solution: Allow for asynchronous learning

• Record video to access later (or again)
• Incorporate other representations
• Provide transcripts, using apps like Otter.ai (has a limited free version), Youtube (Not always accurate), iPhone dictation

Online work: Best practices for teachers to use with students

Materials, handouts, and images can be difficult to access for some students, including those who use screen readers.

1. Be consistent in how you post your content and share information.
2. Create a regular timeline for providing information and activities.
3. Use a consistent layout for sharing tasks and activities. 
4. Offer multiple means of representation.
5. Remember to use multiple means of action and expression.
6. Introduce new tools in low-stakes ways. 
7. Provide a structured drop-in option for help, questions, and support. 

UDL Solution: Make materials accessible

• Create short text descriptions for images and videos.
• Use Word, Google Docs, or another accessible format that have optical character recognition (OCR) for screen reader access.
• Use tools like WebAIM (cost involved) to check written materials, especially PDFs, for screen reader accessibility. 

5 tips for supporting students socially and emotionally during distance learning

Distance learning can make it harder to check-in on and gauge emotional and physical well-being and to provide support to each other. 

1. Schedule regular check-ins with students and their families.

2. Teach strategies for organization, planning, and self-regulation.

3. Read and discuss current events.

4. Assign a project that encourages students to be “helpers.”

5. Share stress-reduction and mindfulness strategies.

UDL solution: Deliberately build a collaborative community

• Build time in for students to connect with each other
• Use “break-out” rooms (Zoom) or have individual/group check-ins with students
• Use discussion boards or collaboration tools like Miro or Padlet

UDL enhancement: Embrace your students as teachers

• Build in interactive ways for students to provide feedback on your plans
• Check in with students about what they need and be flexible and responsive 

How to plan online lessons with Universal Design for Learning (UDL)

Subtracting Mixed Numbers Problem Type 1 (No Borrowing)

Using a Google Doc and Screencastify with Drawing Tools to annotate.

Before Teaching - UDL-Aligned Virtual Lessons

• Think about physical design and layout
• Familiarize yourself with technology platforms
• Give time and patience to student and families to learn technology
• Anticipate misconceptions and questions
• Think about pacing and breaks
  

While Teaching - UDL-Aligned Virtual Lessons

• Leverage options within technology platforms
• Provide choices for how students can interact
• Give students agency over how and when they engage in work
• Be open minded about formats that students’ work can take

After Teaching - UDL-Aligned Virtual Lessons

• Develop a reflection and evaluation practice with yourself and with students
• Read and study up-to-date research
• Engage in learning communities with other educators to learn and share insights

UDL Lessons In 2021 and Beyond

• Don’t feel like you need to implement everything all at once.
• Don’t be afraid to try something new. Expect several iterations.
• Work in partnership with others rather than trying to do it all by yourself.
• Acknowledge that cognitive demands on kids and adults can look and feel different across learning models.
• Prioritize necessary skills and standards for students. Think about how to integrate different skills within lessons and across content areas.
• Think about UDL even when teaching social emotional learning and self-advocacy skills.

Distance learning toolkit: Key practices to support students who learn differently

Wellbeing Won't Cut It Alone!

I thought by reflecting on my journey during this opportunity; I might clarify my thinking and support others. For myself, I believe that it is not wellbeing alone that made this challenge so manageable. It has been the combination of wellbeing, success and engagement, which has enabled me to come through this period refreshed and excited.

In my head, this has never been a crisis, I have seen it as a challenge or opportunity. I have been fortunate like most educators, I have continued to receive my full income. I am in no doubt if my wife or myself lost our incomes, then this would have become a possible crisis.

Do not get me wrong as I have had many moments of self-doubt, stress and anxiety; however, I have managed to work through these. I have come out the other side fresh and reinvigorated in my purpose and role supporting schools.

How have I done this? Let me take you through my reflections focussing on my wellbeing, success and engagement. At the time, I was not aware I was doing things that supported all three aspects.

I remember a colleague once telling a school staff meeting to ensure student success we needed to look at three parts of an equilateral triangle. These parts were student wellbeing, student engagement and student achievement. Missing one would impact on the others as they were all interconnected.

 Since the earthquakes in Christchurch, there has been a real push for wellbeing. As a result, I think we have forgotten about the importance of success and engagement for improving wellbeing.

The image above is my attempt to understand what these three things looked like for me. 

When I started, I was not sure how to define each, so I went to good ole Google. Here are what I have used to describe Wellbeing, Engagement and Success.

Wellbeing - I focussed on the Five Ways to Wellbeing from the Mental Health Foundation NZ.

Success - I used ERO's Valued Student Outcomes and Wellbeing for Success.

Engagement - I used a combination of resources from TKI Student Engagement Teaching as Inquiry, Universal Design for Learning from Inclusive Education and Ka Hikitia Accelerating Success. 

I am going to relate them to my own experiences and why I am feeling so positive and refreshed.

Wellbeing

• Take Notice - One of the simple things that give me joy is having a spa with the family which continued over lockdown.
• Keep Learning - I signed up to two challenges during the lockdown, one around nutrition and the other the 25 days push up challenge. I learnt many new things which I implemented into my daily routine and enjoyed. I did so much professional knowledge building as I am sure many educators did as I worked through what learning from home required to be successful.
• Be Active - I maintained my regular exercise program and even added extra with regular walks with my wife.
• Give - with a colleague; I explored new ways to present content to teachers, learners and whānau online, created resources and shared these with our communities. I connected with friends online, played games with my bubble, supported my wife and children in working and learning from home. However, my wife did most of the learning support for our children while I had online meetings.
• Connect - I connected teachers and leaders I supported either face to face online or through blogging, email and online support and found this very rewarding and enjoyable. I met daily with our national team for a quick update and participated in Friday online drinks. We connected with other family members outside our bubble. We gave our children access to messenger apps that allowed them to communicate with their friends and cousins.

Success

• I participated and contributed confidently in a range of contexts to support teachers, leaders, students, whānau, family, friends and new acquaintances. For example, we created a site to support educators teaching from home and I joined a Whatsapp group to support each other in a nutrition challenge. I was involved in numerous video conferences, messages, emails, and phone calls to connect with others personally and professionally.
• I was a successful lifelong learner completing a nutrition challenge which I gained much new knowledge to support my training and future sporting events. I blogged as I worked through my thinking about the new learnings in lockdown. My children and I learnt lots about how we all work as we came up with strategies to support our learning from home. Once again, I blogged about this to support others who may have had similar issues.
• I have good relationship skills, are self-confident and can bounce back from setbacks. I can lead while being able to self manage and make responsible decisions to ensure my practices are sustainable. One of the things I did that was successful during this time was creating a routine early on and sharing this with all the educators I supported.
• I have self-belief due to the knowledge I am involved with numerous individuals and organisations that know what they are doing. I also know how to navigate the online world when I do not know something to access content, knowledge and skills to support myself. I think this self-belief supports me to be confident in my identity, language and culture as a citizen of New Zealand. This confidence extends to fixing a motor on a washing machine, supporting my son through the meltdown of online learning, or changing the way I look at traditional knowledge of food and education.

Engagement

• Cognitive - I learnt late in my life that I learn best by either doing, watching or talking with others to develop my knowledge and skills.  However, I am also able to draw on other modes of accessing information like text and audio if the situation warrants it. I am lucky the leaders I work with understand learning and therefore provide access to materials in numerous ways. I have been trying to utilise the principles of Universal Design for Learning in my work when supporting others. We had supported our children by looking at the content provided for their learning. When it was not available through the class learning, we found the information in different formats online. 
• Cultural  - this has been an exciting experience seeing how families and organisations, including my own, have created environments online to promote a sense of belonging. The addition of grid view in a Google Meet helped develop a sense of belonging along with the use of secondary smaller online bubbles for more intimate group work. When learning online, there is a real need to show the organisation's culture and values, what makes your audience think "that is my classroom". Acknowledging culture is an area I am developing and often is left till last as I think about how learners will access the content. However, reflecting on this as I write this, what use is equitable access if the learner can not see their culture or values in the content and choose not to engage?
• Behavioural - My children certainly had enjoyed the choice they were given and the freedom of choosing when and how they completed their learning. We did have meltdowns when there were no scaffolds as to how to complete the work or support for the students' workflow. I have been allowed the space to work in a high trust model. I had choice and opportunities for how I interact with material and how I want to show that material in my context. I was able to think about what I could manage in my context and then plan my workload accordingly. I had support and guidance from leadership about how to proceed in our daily meetings. The big enabler was I realised with support from colleagues and reading others experiences what was manageable and sustainable. I think some educators who felt their wellbeing had been impacted by Learning at Home did not modify their behaviours. They proceeded to interact with learners the same way they did face to face.
• Emotional - going into this experience, my colleagues have known me and built relationships with me for seven years. They understand how I work and what support I might need. I think with the work I have done with educators in our online meets has developed stronger relationships. For some, working at home offered an environment with fewer distractions so they could focus on what mattered and changed as needed. It was so awesome seeing my son connect with one of his teachers and the commonalities he found he had with the teacher. Caution needs to be applied, especially in a secondary context as it would be impossible to connect with all your students individually online. I would imagine where educators tried to do this; they may well be exhausted now as we head back to schools.

My personal opinion is that if we solely focus on wellbeing at the expense of the other two, we will end up in a worse position. 

As leaders,

• Can we empower individuals and groups to manage their own lives by focussing on the five ways to wellbeing?
• Could we support them to enable themselves to be successful in life?
• Might we encourage them to engage by considering how we interact with them through material and expectations of evidence? 

Maybe by focussing on all three aspects, we may help to create a  state of being for all that is comfortable, healthy, and happy for the majority of the time.

Equity: is it the Device or Teacher?

There has been an increasing focus on equitable access to education throughout the Covid19 event as it has highlighted the issues with access to education. The event has been challenging my thinking, along with being challenged by my colleague Sharon Spragg to deliver our Cybersmart curriculum differently.

Cybersmart Lesson Tahi - Exploring Blogs

I have a strong drive for equitable access and visibility for education hence why I continue to be involved in education.

Sharon and I are inspired by a number of our colleagues' work, particularly Cam Cameron from Kootuitui ki Papakura Cluster planning our Term 2 Cybersmart Lessons.

My colleague Linda Ojala also gave me some feedback on the site's layout and UDL principles.

If I genuinely believe in equity, then getting the devices into students hands is only the first step. We then need to ensure the content itself is accessible and equitable.

We have attempted to do this following Universal Design for Learning Principles and our own experiences in education. We have tried to take a lesson and differentiate the content into three parts.

The teacher, whether online or face to face, would then modify in response to individual students' needs. They would also emphasise critical thinking and strategic learning. I think we still have a way to go to create lessons that reflect a high competence of UDL however we need to start somewhere and this blog post is the beginning of my reflections into our planning efforts.

So what have we done?
As I stated in the previous paragraph, each lesson is in three parts, beginner, stepping up and confident and is aimed from Year 3 - 10. We are expecting in the classes we work with we will have students ranging from beginners to confident and want to support and stretch all the students. The lessons can be guided by a teacher or completed independently with some teacher or peer support.

Each lesson layout is the same and also colour coded, grey for beginner, blue for stepping up and white for confidence, with a button at the top of each page to take the student to the correct place. We will reflect on our layout once we have taught in some classes to get feedback on the amount of information on each page.

Any text on the web page or in the Google Slides has narration reading the text. We have done this as we find that the text to speech tools can be a bit hit and miss for the students, and we want to remove as many barriers as possible.

Each lesson has a screencast video on the left explaining the learning task and on the right side is the Google Slides of the learning resource. As you can see in the slideshow, there is a Learn Create Share overview, videos teaching, explaining or modelling the tasks as well as instructions to work through the learning.

Each lesson also has a "Pathway for Learning" to support students who like a pathway or list to support their learning. These may be added to the slides in the future; however, at the moment, they are separate as some students may like them printed out so they can tick off each task as they do it. I know personally, my son loves the format on the left, whereas my daughter prefers the one on the right. Maybe another future step is colour coding the list to Learn Create Share?

In my head, this sort of access to learning for the student should

• Free me up as a teacher to rove and support students with discussions and critical thinking.
• Allow time for students to choose and opt into workshops and conferencing to support their learning.
• Empower students to drive their learning and choose when they wish to complete the work.
• Spend longer on a lesson if it interests them and go deeper by moving onto the next stage for example beginner to stepping up
• Reduce time the students have to wait for the teacher to explain the learning

The planning of this content has been time-consuming and has added to our workload; however, we are getting faster as we develop our processes for recording sound etc.
How would I make this work if I was in a classroom?

• Just like learning at home, I would reduce the content I wanted to get through. LESS IS MORE!
• Collaborate with others to plan content and share the workload.
• Utilise Multi Text databases, and other teachers work off their sites.
• Use everyday authentic texts that are engaging and interest students, such as journals and books both online and offline. 
• Plan for one to two-week lessons allowing more time for discussion about the texts and learning. Separate discussion from collaboration. What is the quality of the conversation that these students are having?
• Go wider and deeper into texts about an area instead of more texts on lots of topics. Focus on the thinking about thinking, e.g. "Do I have evidence, have I justified myself, is this an opinion or a fact etc."
• Allow more time for the Learn. Encourage students having a role in the workshops, for example, questioner, summariser etc. Do students understand what is expected of them, and they have permission to speak and think?
• Allow more time to Create. All these lessons work on the assumption the teacher will encourage and empower students who are capable to utilise the best tool to present their learning depending on the task.
• Allow more time to share. Collaborating and making choices in the sharing. Encourage students to think "what is the purpose of sharing this artifact?". "Why did you choose to share in that particular way?  

If we believe in equity, then this is the next step in supporting students to ensure all our students discover success in their learning. It should work in all subject areas and right across the curriculum.

I think It is well worth the effort! Do you?

Please comment on any ideas or suggestions you have to make our teaching more accessible to our learners.

The writing process and a Year 9 Student - A Students Reflection

This is Megan's reflection of the Writing Process using digital tools.

What did you like about the tools for writing?

• I really liked using poppet it was really easy to use and it was easy to organise the way you wanted it to be and you could move the text boxes around wherever you wanted to. 
• Wordle was very useful just because it was a different and cool way to show what words you had used too much. 
• The speech selection was also good because it would speed up it's talking when there wasn't enough commas and full stops. 
• Book creator was a good app to use once you got the hang of it to set out your work. 
• Write about this was a good app to decide what to write about it had good pictures to use if you wanted to and it was just good in general because I'm pretty sure it had topics.

What barriers or problems did you find with the tools?

• With dictanote I found it very awkward to use because it did not fully understand my voice and I feel like if you were to use this in the classroom that the computer would go physco trying to understand what you were saying. 
• Book creator was a little bit fiddly at the start learning how to use it and putting the text in the right place was a bit annoying.

What did you like about Write About This?

It was a a good app to get an idea of what you were going to write about. I think I got one of my pictures in the book from there.

What barriers/issues/problems can you see with using Write About This at home/school?

It looked like it was made for little kids, the app could be designed for older kids and teenagers.

What did you like about Popplet?

It was handy to show your ideas clearly and you could customise it sort of.

What barriers/issues/problems can you see with using Popplet at home/school?

I don't know I thought it was a good app overall and I would use it and I'm sure that other kids would use it in class

What did you like about Googles Docs/Track Changes?

I already use it at school so I am used to it now, I like it because it has the search thing at the side of the screen that you can get images and just normal google search. It's good so you know what you have fixed and you can go back and and change it back again.

What barriers/issues/problems can you see with using Google Docs/Track Changes at home/school?

Not having internet and having other apps and program's already like Word and Pages. You would have to know how to track changes in add ons and not many people know how to use it.

What did you like about Wordle?

I liked wordle because it all you have to do is copy and paste all your writing in and it makes the words you use most the boldest. It's quite a good tool because then you can compare your changes with the first time you did it.

What barriers/issues/problems can you see with using Wordle at home/school?

No internet. On the iPad it doesn't like using it because I tried and it didn't work. Wordle is a Web Based Java program the equivalent on an iPad may be Word Collage  https://itunes.apple.com/nz/app/word-collage/id527057508?mt=8 

What did you like about Speak Selection - iPad reading your text aloud?

I liked it because it would speed up speaking when there wasn't enough commas and full stops.

What barriers/issues/problems can you see with using Speak Selection at home/school?

It had a Horrible voice which made it a bit frustrating but you could have it set to your voice maybe.

What did you like about Book Creator?

It was a good way to set out your work. Once you knew how to use it, it was quite good.

What barriers/issues/problems can you see with using Book Creator?

Not knowing how to use it. It took a while to figure out to change the font and change the size of the words. It was just quite fiddly in general.

What other tools or digital opportunities would you like to see at school?

Getting to use more apps in school to help our learning. I think that the teachers need some training about new apps to help kids in the classroom.

Anything else you would like to share about the day?

It was a good use of my work day.

The writing process and a Year 9 Student - My reflection

Last Friday I had the opportunity to work with a student from the local college who was on work day and I employed her to play with some of the apps I had found and to give me feedback from a students points of view. I was thinking as part of the writing process she could use digital technologies to enable her to express her creativity.Megan is a Year 9 who does not particularly enjoy writing however she is a very creative person.

Megan started by using Popplet to create a brainstorm of what she wanted to write about. After a few moments it was apparent that she needed more guidance around the topic and what to write about. Using Write About app gave her some ideas to create her story. Once Megan had chosen a topic she asked if she could brainstorm her ideas using pen and paper.

Once Megan completed the brainstorm I asked to her to create a copy using Popplet so she had an experience of using Popplet as a brainstorming tool.

Reflection of Popplet

On reflection some students would not choose Popplet as their first choice as a brainstorming tool and neither would I. To brainstorm I like to get my ideas on paper as it gives me more freedom to quickly build a mental image of my thinking.

In hindsight I tend to use an electronic brainstorm when I need to publish the output and would generally still choose paper over digital for my own personal use. In a class situation with a group brainstorm I can see the power of collaborative brainstorms that are digital and would lean towards Popplet or similar.

Drafting was done using Dictanote as was this reflection. Dictanote was not an easy tool to use on the Megan’s Acer Laptop as the microphone did not pick up the words well. We tried to calibrate the microphone and used the train the computer to Megan’s voice with little success. We also tried my Macbook however I think it was tuned into my voice and this did not work well either.

Reflection of Dictanote

• Works best on an individuals own device
• need to set spoken i to capitalise to I
• Takes awhile to learn the tool but worth the effort (device also takes awhile to learn your voice)
• Speak naturally and pause to allow dictanote to catch up
• realise there will be mistakes that need to be fixed later (try not to fix as you go)
• Really need a good brainstorm with good sequence to help prompt speaker what to say next
• Stop mic recording to enable think time
• Text will need cut and pasted into a word doc or equivalent to edit

Using google docs Megan drafted her writing using her handwritten brainstorm as a guide.  On completion of drafting we cut and pasted her text into Wordle keeping the common words boxed ticked to enable repeated words to be shown larger on the wordle.

We used Wordle to see which words were most commonly used, in the case above we focussed on cutting back the use of and. From the Wordle Megan focussed on what words can be changed in her writing to make it more interesting.

Reflection of Wordle

• Needs flash plugin on a Mac
• Fantastic to focus students into words they have used too much. The above Wordle shows how Megan used and to join sentences together.
• Visual easy to see or screenshot

Finally we turned track changes on in Google Docs and Megan went about the process of editing her writing.

I emailed the text of the document to myself and opened the email on my iPad. This enabled me to use speak selection on the iPad and get Megan's text read aloud so she could hear her mistakes. The less punctuation the faster the iPad speaks the text, so easier to hear where punctuation needs to go.

Reflection of Speak Selection

• Easy to use
• Makes mistakes very obvious
• Student can hear and fix the mistakes as they go
• The less punctuation the faster the iPad reads, inserting punctuation correctly, slows down the speaker.

Finally we used Book Creator to publish Megan’s writing by cutting and pasting the text from the google doc into Book Creator. Some images were added to the book and then it was published to iBooks and as a PDF.

On reflection the day was a great success for me as I gained a lot of in sights in how to use the apps in a class situation. I also feel it was successful for Megan as she produced a good piece of writing and hopefully will use some of the tools she used with me in her own work. Even though it looks like a long process it was very quick to flick between apps and digital tools to complete the writing.

Dictanote or an equivalent app really would allow a reluctant writer much greater opportunities to get text onto a page as long as you are willing to give some time to learn the skill of dictating text.

Thank you very much Megan for allowing me the opportunity to work with you.