My thanks to Mrs. Krista Spahr, Calvin College, for this resource and the quote below:
Universal Design for Learning (UDL) is meant to minimize barriers and to maximize learning.
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Reflections from DSC:
Though I still have much to learn about Universal Design for Learning (UDL), my initial thought is that I really like this approach, as it moves us away from the one-size-fits-all approach and towards a teaching and learning environment that offers more choice, more selection, and more opportunities for customization and personalization. Plus, as companies such as Apple and Microsoft have seen, functionality that started out trying to address accessibility-related needs ended up helping everyone!
Along these lines, I created this graphic years ago — with the idea that students would have a choice on which media they might prefer to use to absorb the information:
Again, the idea being that we could provide the same content in 3-5 different ways and let the students select what works best for them. Plus, in the example above, we could even see how other students are describing/making meaning of something.
But it goes further than this as I’m understanding UDL. For example, the methods for achieving a learning outcome can be greatly varied, as the assignments for a particular outcome might be reaching via watching a video clip, or reading a book, or doing a project, or writing a story, or creating music, or ___(fill in the blank) ____.
Also see:
Debt to degree: A new way of measuring college success — from educationsector.org by Kevin Carey and Erin Dillon
Excerpt:
The American higher education system is plagued by two chronic problems: dropouts and debt. Barely half of the students who start college get a degree within six years, and graduation rates at less-selective colleges often hover at 25 percent or less. At the same time, student loan debt is at an all-time high, recently passing credit card debt in total volume.1 Loan default rates have risen sharply in recent years, consigning a growing number of students to years of financial misery. In combination, drop-outs and debt are a major threat to the nation’s ability to help students become productive, well-educated citizens.
But how do you move forward with such an innovation, when there isn’t definitive proof that it will work? That is the key question educators and policymakers are grappling with.
Under the education priorities of President George W. Bush’s administration, the catchphrase “research base” was drilled into educators” heads when it came to new programs and initiatives. If it wasn’t research-based, it wasn’t worth adopting.
But technology innovations occur so rapidly that it’s often impossible to do scientifically based trials proving effectiveness before schools embrace new approaches. Think of social-networking tools, iPads, and e-readers. And what other new digital-learning tools might also emerge well before scientifically based research can justify their use in classrooms?
Also see:
From DSC:
From my 20+ years of experience with working with a variety of technologies, while there is an element of risk taking to implementing technologies, there are also enormous payoffs if organizations implement the appropriate technologies.
But how can we select and implement the most effective technologies? This is where we need to rely on our technologists out there and keep them growing in the knowledge of “the business”, not just the technologies. Tell them what you are trying to achieve, and they can greatly assist. No one can hit 100% — but good technologists can get you into the right game and into the right ballpark (if not exactly lining up the exact right players, which may change or take some tweaking).
NOTE:
Don’t rely on technologists who only see their jobs as keeping the systems running. Though we need technologists who keep the infrastructures up and running, at this juncture what organizations really need are visionaries who are knowledgeable about the needs of the business (as well as the technologies), and those who are willing to explore, experiment, and take some risks…i.e. to lead….to be instrumental in forming strategies and visions. The areas outside IT need to be aware of how critical technologies are becoming in their core strategies and plans. It’s not the same ball-game as it was. Those who use technologies strategically will survive and thrive.
It should be noted that there have been risks inherent in maintaining the status quo — a 20%-30% dropout rate (in K-12) across the United States is pretty risky too, at least in my mind.
The True Significance of ‘Gainful Employment’ — from InsideHigherEd.com by Doug Lederman
Excerpt:
Largely lost in the instant analyses, pro and con, though, was the long-term significance of the department’s actions. The “gainful employment” rules, as they have come to be known, represent a powerful and potentially game-changing shift in how the federal government looks at higher education. The agency has written into federal policy, for the first time, a direct (if crude) attempt to measure the value of an academic program, by linking a measure of student expenditure (student loan debt burden) with an outcome measure (graduates’ average income).
This current approach applies only to non-liberal-arts programs at for-profit colleges and to vocational non-degree programs at public and private nonprofit colleges — for the moment. But now that the federal government has such a tool, many observers agree, it’s hard to imagine that it won’t seek to apply it more broadly — if not this administration or Congress, then a future one.
John Hunter on the World Peace Game — TED March 2011 — my thanks to Mr. Joseph and Mrs. Kate Byerwalter for this great presentation
About this talk
John Hunter puts all the problems of the world on a 4’x5′ plywood board — and lets his 4th-graders solve them. At TED2011, he explains how his World Peace Game engages schoolkids, and why the complex lessons it teaches — spontaneous, and always surprising — go further than classroom lectures can.
About John Hunter
Teacher and musician John Hunter is the inventor of the World Peace Game (and the star of the new doc “World Peace and Other 4th-Grade Achievements”).
EdWeek’s 2011 Technology Counts — from The Future of Education by Jesse Moyer
Also see the report at:
Why badges work better than grades — from Learning, Freedom and the Web by Cathy Davidson
Evidence of learning online: Assessment beyond the paper — from CampusTechnology.com by Judith Boettcher
…learning designer Judith Boettcher examines online assessment strategies beyond the traditional end-of-term paper.
Excerpts:
Professional Work Products
Interviews
The interview medium is a very flexible communication tool and can be used by both faculty and students for demonstrating understanding and eliciting the state of concept development. Here are some possible strategies that can require research, critical thinking, and writing.
Audio, Video, and Visual Projects
What about other media such as audio and video projects? Today’s learners live surrounded by audio and video and the tools that make it possible for everyone to create and produce audio and video products. Here are some of the possibilities with audio and video spaces.
Blogs
Blogs are a very underutilized writing space. Blogs share many characteristics with journals and thus can capture snapshots of what learners are thinking, and when; plus they often can also capture the sources of some of their thinking. Blogs help learners understand the growth cycle of learning new concepts and how and why they think the way they do. Here are some ideas on how blogs, both personal and class, might be used.
Wikis
From DSC:
As I was reviewing Mel’s presentation, I couldn’t help but think of the amazing amount of pressure colleges and universities will be under towards “standardization” — or at minimum, institutions may need to accept much of what has occurred at another school. The costs are too high not to — and the expectations from parents, students, legislatures, and the general public may force this to occur.
Along these lines, I think that the dynamics of teaching and learning change when we talk about the cost of an education going from a few thousand to 150,000+ for 4 years. Expectations are one thing that change; Mel’s presentation points to this a bit. But I also wondered…how will institutions of higher education differentiate themselves if these pressures for portability continue to build? How will they keep from becoming a commodity?
Also noteworthy was Mel’s slide re: what students can ultimately DO as a result of their educations — this may become more of the Holy Grail of Assessment.
