Digital Badge G

The concept of Universal Design for Learning (UDL) was really interesting! The three different designs of learning opened up a whole new view of teaching for me. Multiple means of representation is something that I feel like is my strength out of the three. I can easily take one objective and teach it many different ways until someone gets it and can understand it. Multiple means of expression is a cool way to think about teaching. I’m always thinking about how I can express what I know to students differently, but never really take into consideration how they can express what they know differently. The third is multiple means of engagement, is definitely something I need to work on. I feel like it would be easy to learn about each student and what they like and how to incorporate those things into their learning environment.

Other than the things they enjoy, it is important to incorporate their disabilities into consideration when incorporating technology into the classroom. There are different levels of technology to consider though, and access to them could depend on the school. Low-tech accommodations are easy and inexpensive, so they are usually the easiest option. Mid-tech accommodations include shifts in teaching and need the use of digital materials. High-tech accommodations include computer incorporation and other special technology. A few years ago my mom had a student in her class that has Downs Syndrome, and they added a touch screen computer for him to use during computer centers because he could not use the mouse.

Word clouds are an interesting concept. They are a simple way of introducing a story or piece of text to the class without just having a picture of a rabbit or a dog to introduce the story. They consist of words from the text, with the most frequently used words bigger than the rest. I think it is a good way to engage the students in a simple way. It is a good example of the UDL of multiple means of engagement.

I have made a Prezi of the things I have discussed in this blog as my digital tool. I think it is another interesting way to engage the students. When I was a student and I saw a Prezi for the first time, I was amazed! It is so much more fun than a boring powerpoint, and I would like to continue using them for my classroom.