Universal Design for Learning (UDL) and Accessibility

1. Universal Design for Learning (UDL) and Accessibility Bill Harrison Sr. Instructional Designer Online Studies/Faculty Innovation Center (FIC) Daytona State College All inclusive education no matter what!

2. What is UDL? • Roots in UD for physical spaces • Ramps, auto doors, door levers, curb cutouts are universally helpful • A research-based set of principles to guide the design of learning environments that are accessible and effective for all. • Based on cognitive neuroscience and identifies three brain networks that are involved in learning: • Affective Network • Recognition Network • Strategic Network • Proactive - design learning experiences that are accessible to ALL learners right from the start, so in many cases, it's not necessary to make accommodations for individual students.

3. What is UDL?

4. Affective Networks • Help learners answer: • Why should I care about this? • Why should I learn it? • Why is this important to me? • Potential Barriers • Learners don't understand the purpose of the lesson.  • The assignment is too easy or too difficult. • The assignment has no value in the learner's life.  • Learners may lack executive functions or coping strategies.  • Learners may think the content is boring or irrelevant.  • Learners may be embarrassed to ask questions.  • Learners may have insufficient background knowledge. 

5. Attend to Affective Networks • Recruiting and capturing their interest • Help learners make connections to prior knowledge and experiences. • Share the goal or purpose of the assignment or reading. • Design material so it's relevant to learner needs and interests. • Connect learning to the real world. • Provide detailed directions, examples, rubrics, and options for assignments. • Fostering Self-regulation • Require learners to evaluate their work using the rubric as a guide. • Ask them to assign themselves a grade for each criterion. • Ask them to identify areas of strength and areas they need to improve upon. • Provide students with opportunities to reflect on their learning and their learning processes to see what's working and what isn't. • Sustaining effort and persistence • Provide opportunities for learners to develop their work. • Establish touchpoints so that learners can receive feedback on their work. • Require learners to submit drafts of their work. • Provide developmental feedback and require them to incorporate the feedback into their final submission. • Require learners to conduct peer reviews and use the rubric to provide feedback to one another. • Encourage learners to make and learn from their mistakes.

6. Recognition Networks • Answer these questions: • What information or skills are we focusing on? • What strategies can I use to help learners make sense of this information? • Potential Barriers for text • Poor vision • Inability to decode text • Poor reading comprehension • Slow reading • Lack of background knowledge • Difficulty understanding the vocabulary • Unfamiliar with the symbols or acronyms being used • Reading level of text is too difficult • Text structure is difficult to follow • Unclear purpose for reading

7. Recognition Networks • Potential Barriers for lectures and video • Hearing impairment • Attention issues • Poor memory • Lack of background knowledge • Unfamiliar vocabulary or subject matter terms • English as a second language - translation difficulty • Unclear purpose for viewing

8. Attend to Recognition Networks • Perception • Offer different reading levels and structures and non-text options • Websites • Textbook • Journal or news articles • Audio or video • Image/diagrams • Language, Mathematical Expression, and Symbols • Pre-teach vocabulary • Provide alternative text descriptions for graphic information • Preteach and highlight mathematical expressions or equations • Accompany symbols with text support

9. Attend to Recognition Networks • Comprehension • Strategies for improving text comprehension include providing: • A purpose for reading • An introduction to establish context • Guided questions to focus learners on important points and concepts • Reading or viewing guides • Graphic organizers for notetaking • E-versions of texts so students can customize according to their preferences • Strategies for readings, lectures, or videos include: • Activating background knowledge • Clarifying misconceptions • Highlighting relationships and critical features • Connecting new ideas to existing understandings • Strategies for vocabulary development include: • Providing new terms ahead of time • Directing learners toward resources like glossaries • Telling learners why it's important to be familiar with discipline specific terms • Creating "check your understanding" quizzes

10. Strategic Networks • Answer these questions: • How will my learners show me what they have learned? • How will they demonstrate mastery of learning? • Potential Barriers • Traditional Tests • Test anxiety may cause learners to perform poorly. • Skipped questions may cause answers to be tracked incorrectly. • Learners may misunderstand the directions. • Learners may have poor recall of isolated facts, details, or concepts. • Time constraints may cause learners to perform poorly. • Papers or Projects • Learners don't know how/where to begin. • Learners don't know how to organize information.  • Learners may not have a clear understanding of the task/grading criteria.

11. Attend to Strategic Networks • Provide choices • Papers • Tests • Quizzes • Projects • Videos • Presentations • Interviews • Discussions • Graphic Organizers • Drawings • Infographics • Advertisements • Brochures 

12. Attend to Strategic Networks • Provide support • Modeling • Examples • Rubrics • Checklists • Groups • Partners • Discussions • Practice Opportunities • Developmental Feedback • Practice Quizzes

13. UDL Resources • Center for Applied Special Technology (CAST) (http://www.cast.org/) • UDL Guidelines (http://udlguidelines.cast.org/) • Universal Design For Learning: Theory and Practice • Free PDF book but requires account and login • http://udltheorypractice.cast.org/login

14. Accessibility – Setting the Stage • Accessibility is about equality • Accommodations are no longer enough • In recent years proponents of the field of disability studies have moved the conversation from the medical model of disability, which views disability as a deficit in the person, to the social model of disability, which views disability as the result of an inaccessible environment.

15. Accessibility vs Accommodation • Accessibility is proactive • Students DO NOT have to self-identify • Accommodations are reactive • things we do during instruction to meet a specific and unique need of a student that we can’t do ahead of time • Student has registered with disability services

16. Accessibility – Setting the Stage https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PQGFshzLPXE&feature=youtu.be

17. Accessibility • Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA) of 1990 • https://www.ada.gov/ • Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 • https://www.dol.gov/oasam/regs/statutes/sec504.htm • Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 • https://www.section508.gov/ • Section 508 refresh • https://www.section508.gov/blog/access-board-updates-ict-requirements • References WCAG 2.0 (https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG20/ )levels A and AA conformance and applies them not only to websites, but also to electronic documents and software.

18. Accessibility – Document Structure • Page titles • Helps users know where they are • Headings • Use correct heading in correct order, don’t just enlarge text and make bold • Only one heading level 1 (H1) per document • Lists • Correctly mark as list, don’t just type numbers, letters • Links • Identifiable (underlined) and meaningful out of context. NEVER USE “CLICK HERE”

19. Accessibility – Document Structure • Fonts • Minimize number of fonts • Language • Use as simple language as possible • Color • Do not use color alone to convey meaning • Ensure high contrast ratio • Color Contrast Checker (https://webaim.org/resources/contrastchecker/) • Tables • Captions, row and column headers • Use tab key to check reading order and ensure can navigate by keyboard • Very Important in PowerPoint

20. Accessibility – Media • Images • Meaning alternative text • Not just a description of image but accurately describes the image's purpose or author's intent in using the image • DO NOT use the phrases "image of ...” or"graphic of ..." to describe the image • Audio • Provide transcript • Video • Provide close caption (CC) and/or transcript • YouTube provides machine CC and transcription but must edit for accuracy

21. Accessibility – 3rd Party Pubisher Content • External content used in your courses must also be accessible • Check videos for CC or transcript • Use the WebAim Accessibility Checker (https://wave.webaim.org/)to check external webpages • Look for voluntary product accessibility template (VPAT)

22. Accessibility - Demo time and resources • WebAim (https://webaim.org/) • WCAG 2.0 (https://www.w3.org/TR/WCAG20/) • WAVE HTML Accessibility Checker (https://wave.webaim.org/) • Color Contrast Checker (https://webaim.org/resources/contrastchecker/) • MS Office Accessibility Checker for Windows (https://support.office.com/en-us/article/use-the-accessibility-checker-to-find-accessibility-issues-a16f6de0-2f39-4a2b-8bd8-5ad801426c7f) • MS Office Accessibility Checker for Mac (https://support.office.com/en-us/article/use-the-accessibility-checker-on-your-mac-to-find-and-resolve-accessibility-issues-3b84295e-d55b-49f1-b443-523ec45a5232) • Adobe Acrobat Accessibility (https://helpx.adobe.com/acrobat/using/create-verify-pdf-accessibility.html) • One Page Cheat Sheets (http://ncdae.org/resources/cheatsheets/)

23. Questions? Any questions? My Contact Info • Bill Harrison • William.harrison@daytonastate,edu • 386.506.4306