First of all, if you don’t fancy reading my blog post, you can listen to me chat about it over here instead while you do something valuable with your time!
Link: https://vimeo.com/511546514#t=138s
If you’d rather spend 30 seconds flicking through my slide deck, I have provided you with that option here too.
Whichever option you choose, I hope you find it enjoyable!
I started my journey to earn a Universal Design for Learning Digital Badge with AHEAD and UCD at the end of last year. On reflection, I was pleasantly surprised by the number of areas that I had already integrating UDL principles into my teaching and learning practice. However, I had not been aware that I was doing so. I believe that it is due largely to the fact that my background is working with adults with mild to moderate intellectual disabilities. Many of my students are people with autism. Often, they would also have a physical or learning disability.
A ‘one size fits all’ approach was never an option, so I got comfortable exploring alternative means of engagement, representation and, of course, expression. I just never considered it from the lens of UDL. Completing the course allowed me to frame the work, learn the correct language, and be more mindful of the decisions I was making as an educator. What stands out to me is that we do not have to be perfect. Some new approaches, technologies, or strategies may not work first time. They may never work. However, by embracing an active inquiry cycle we are involving the students in the design process and this alone can have a positive impact for students to feel involved in decision making within their classrooms.
The course that I focused on for this redesign project was the QQI Level 6 Technologies and Learning Certificate at the National College of Ireland. This is a course I have lectured on for over 2 years. I teach multiple cohorts each year. This is usually a blended experience, however this year it was run entirely remotely which removed my face-to-face time with the group completely and therefore reduced my ability to be able to connect with the learners as I normally would.
We had 28 practitioners in the Further Education sector on this course. They have a range of experience and backgrounds – from hair and makeup to horticulture – but the majority were on the course as they felt a need to learn how and why to use technologies in their own educational context.
One of the key areas that I was keen to explore was student self-assessment, reflection, and the means of expression and representation in these processes. I wanted to see if I could create a way to provide alternative paths for the group but also allow me to connect with them.
On day one, I provided the class with the opportunity to take a self-assessment to use as an indicator for their current understanding and use of technologies in their classroom. This is an online tool: Digital Competence Framework for Educators (DigCompEdu). This would also be completed at the end of the course and a self-comparison made to see if there had been growth in any of the various sections of the assessment, for example: ‘The use of technology to empower learners’.
Following this task, I would normally have provided an option to write a reflective journal to share their self-assessment stories – what surprised them, areas to work on, their goals for the course – and post this online throughout the course. This year, I decided to introduce a platform called Flipgrid. This is a tool to allow for simple, free, and accessible video discussion as an alternative to written reflections for those on the course who felt they wanted to share their learning and experiences through a different mode.
I had a number of concerns, including the potential low digital literacy of some in the group. To support them, I created easy to access links that were made available on Moodle and Microsoft Teams. I also created a guest access system so any who were still figuring out the multiple other platforms on the course wouldn’t be overwhelmed. Finally, I gave a live online demonstration to the group and also recorded the first video myself so they could get a sense of what it might look like when they recorded.
The European Framework for the Digital Competence of Educators
One of the key areas that I was keen to explore was student self-assessment, reflection, and the means of expression and representation in these processes. I wanted to see if I could create a way to provide alternative paths for the group but also allow me to connect with them.
24 of 28 in the cohort opted to use Flipgrid, despite each of them being new to the platform. In one section, we had 607 views with 16 comments between the group with almost 9 hours of engagement.
This high engagement also hits one of the key UDL principles and was one the areas which surprised me most. This may be due to the fact that I was able to leave video recorded feedback and responses to each video but also all of the group could see each other and their reflections.
I had connected with the group and they were using their own personal means of expressing their learning, representing themselves as they wanted to and that the engagement levels were evident. It should be noted that this was not a graded part of the course, so these levels of engagement were unexpected. I believe one of the factors was that I was demonstrating a technology that they could learn from experientially and bring to their own classrooms.
Overall, I believe this was a success in terms of my aims and the feedback from the group has been very positive. As you can see above, one of the group stated, “It’s been a great success in my practice!”
The initial stage was challenging but once the group built up trust, they carried this throughout the course. My next focus, in terms of UDL, will be to explore how to stimulate motivation at early stages of these online courses and how to best sustain enthusiasm for learning by providing more alternative means of engagement throughout the course, and not only for the self-reflection stage.