The DL on UDL

Recently we have been studying and discussing UDL (Universal Design for Learning) in our cohort class.  In this post, I will give you the down low on UDL.

Sometimes in education we might feel bogged down with acronyms and find that our profession is being reduced to a series of letters to describe what we do.  ("I teach in an IB school, mainly in the MYP years, which does cater well to our LD students, especially if we focus on using UDL and TPACK.")  SOS!

Despite adding yet another acronym to our repertoire, I think you will find that taking a closer look at UDL, even for just a few minutes of your time will be well worth it.

What is UDL?
Here is a great, basic defintion from CAST.org:
Universal Design for Learning
is a set of principles for curriculum development that give all individuals equal opportunities to learn.

Here is a nice graphic that shows the UDL concept:

Source

To continue building your knowledge of UDL, I would encourage you to create an account on the CAST UDL Lesson Builder site.  Here you will be able to look at model UDL lesson plans that will show well how to take the UDL guidelines and incorporate them into a lesson.  

Also, the CAST.org site is a valuable resource for understanding UDL.  You can find a basic overview here.

Detailed descriptions of the UDL guidelines and ways to use them in the class room can be found here.

Finally, in the spirit of UDL, I revamped a lesson that I teach in my French 1 class, and tried to look at a variety of ways I could incorporate the UDL guidelines into this lesson.  Please take a look at the lesson here.  (The CAST UDL Lesson Builder site model was used for this lesson.)

Hopefully you will also find these principles intriguing and useful as you continue to revamp your lesson plans to meet the needs of all of our 21st century learners!

TPACK! Everyone's diggin' it!

What?  You don't know what TPACK is?  Well fellow educators, it isn't the latest dance craze, boy band, or protein bar you should be eating, but it IS something you should know about, especially in regards to navigating the sometimes murky and uncharted waters of 21st century teaching and learning.

(But don't feel bad... I didn't know what TPACK was either until just this week!)

A nice overview of the basic ideas of the TPACK model can be found in this article by Punya Mishra and Matthew Koehler.  First we should know that TPACK stands for Technological Pedagogical and Content Knowledge.  Well, that sounds fancy, but what does it mean?

As educators, we all must be masters of our content area, but we also must understand the "art of teaching" (pedagogy.)  In the past few decades, however, a third element to the art of teaching has come into play, and that is technology.  If we do not understand how to best meld pedagogy, content, and technology, we are failing to connect with our students and meet their needs.

The following diagram shows and explains the various sides of the TPACK model.  Ideally, we are working to line up our lessons to fall in the middle.  The other overlaps also have their place, and can work very well, but our goal should be the middle whenever possible.

SOURCE

  
Integrating technology successfully is not a simple task.  It takes time, thought, research, experimentation, trial and error... honestly, it can be a bit overwhelming for many teachers.  How  do we even start?  Where do we begin?

Mishra and Koehler point out the fact that most technologies today being used in classrooms weren't even created for educational purposes.  Our job is to take a look at the technologies surrounding us and "repurpose" them as we see fit for instructional purposes.  Now, as teachers, we have two choices.  We can think of this as something that is a drag and try to resist change, or we can look at this as something fun and exciting!

Before we look at ways to repurpose technologies, let's lay down some ground rules:

1.  "Blinged out" Prezis  ≠ Learning
Just because you are having your students use technology, doesn't mean it is creating learning.    As outlined in this short, but to the point video about TPACK, the creator asks some very good questions we should keep in mind as we look to integrate technology.  For example, "Is the technology appropriate for the lesson objectives?"  They also point out the fact that if the technology side is much "heavier" than the other two, the "novelty of the technology overshadows the learning objective."  We can't just "do technology" for the sake of doing technology!  The fact that our students spent 6 days in the computer lab making awesome Prezis doesn't mean they mastered the content of the particular unit.

2.  Be willing to play
We all love the feeling of being able to grab last year's file folders of already prepared quizzes and project direction sheets, but could a particular unit benefit from some technology integration?  Probably.  Don't be afraid or unwilling to experiment and take the time to play.  You won't regret it.  And your students will think you are a Rock Star.

3.  Don't be afraid to break the rules
This piece of advice also comes from the Mishra and Koehler article.  They remind us that when it comes to technology integration we need to know which rules to bend, which to break, and which to leave alone.  Again, it all comes down to being willing to play, and willing to think outside the box.

Personally in my classroom I have had a lot of fun and success repurposing many different technologies to help meet instructional objectives.  Part of my job teaching French is to get kids to speak a new language, and not be intimidated doing so.  Technology can help greatly with this.  Many years ago I taught myself the basics of video editing, and use video editing software to create and upload videos to my class YouTube channel.  I have been blogging myself for many years now, especially keeping track of my travels overseas, but have found blogging as a great tool to have kids reflect weekly on what is going on in class.  I would be lost without my class WikiSpace and use this as a method of posting weekly homework, but also useful links, games that we play on my Smart Board, bookmarking/embedding videos and sound files, and also posting mp3 files of my students' speaking tests for them to self critique, as well as mp3s of them singing the various songs we learn in class.  Finally, we have just started using Twitter as a way of informally using the language, sharing links, and answering basic questions in French for fun, as well as looking at which hashtags are trending in France as great conversation starters.

Whew.

So, that might seem quite intimidating, but the above paragraph represents about 10 years of work, playing, learning, and tweaking.  The best advice I can give someone new to integrating technology is START SMALL.  Start with 1 goal, for 1 class.  Or 1 unit.  Maybe all you do by the end of the school year is videotape some presentations and upload them to YouTube.  Or start a blog for just 1 class.  Have students submit 1 assignment via Google Docs rather than hard copies.  Start with what you feel comfortable with.  Or something you personally enjoy or are interested in learning.

Have fun and let's all help each other navigate to the center of the TPACK rings.

PS.  For the fun of it, I looked for TPACK results in French, and yes, the concept has definitely been translated for French educators also!

Video in French about TPACK here.
Article here.