A Universal Design For Learning Wiki Page Review (Choice Assignment)

As I mentioned in my first post, I am coming into special education with very limited experience. I volunteer on one of my days off at my old elementary school. I work with a Master teacher who  has over 20 years of teaching experience under her belt. In my capacity as a volunteer, I have observed and worked with a wide variety of students with varying abilities. It was there where I first came across the modern special education student. I say modern because when I was in elementary school, special ed students where only seen on the bus on the way to school and on the way home. They were pulled out of the classrooms for the entire day and I would only encounter them at lunch or recess. That archaic mentality has fallen to the wayside and nowadays these students are in the regular ed classroom with their peers for the majority of the day as well they should be.

This being my first special education class, I am impressed at how each new topic we cover seems to add to my ever increasing respect for the field. 

So let us begin. The Universal Design For Learning (UDL) wiki page http://udl.wiki.ciu20.org/home is a treasure trove of knowledge that will benefit every teacher should they choose to explore that knowledge.

UDL stresses 3 very important things:
1. That there multiple means of representation, to give learners various ways of acquiring information and knowledge.
2. There are multiple means of expression, to provide learners alternatives for demonstrating what they know.
3. There are multiple means of engagement, to tap into learners interests, offer appropriate challenges, and increase motivation.

The wiki page is a well thought out and easy to navigate website for both educators and parents who want to be more involved in their children's education. 

Among the things that caught my attention was the explanation of UDL and it's three tenets; the sample UDL lessons that every teacher should check out; directions on how to create an E-book; and lastly a link to a special education teacher's blog http://anitas.edublogs.org  that details one teacher's experiences in the field. The list goes on and on and I cannot wait to go back and explore further.