Principle of Engagement - Guideline 3 - Criterion 1

 

When developing a course using the third principle of Universal Design for Learning, there are three specific guidelines to assist us.  The third, Emotional Capacity (formerly Self-Regulation) addresses managing emotion, thoughts, and behaviors, as well as empathizing with others.

Criterion 1 of this guideline advocates that we promote expectations and attitudes that optimize motivation

Everyone has intimate knowledge of what they find personally motivating and this is an important aspect to self-regulation.  Learners need to be able to set personal goals that they can reasonably obtain, as well as foster positive beliefs that they will be able to meet their goals.  Successfully accommodating this will require allowing for ways that learners can curtail frustration and eschew anxiety that many face while striving to meet their goals.  This will require multiple options for learners to help stay motivated.

To do this, you may consider:

• Providing guides, rubrics, prompts, and checklists to encourage increasing the length of on task orientation and elevating the frequency of self-reflection and self-reinforcements 
• Create activities that support self-reflection and identifying, and assessing, personal goals
• Explicitly and implicitly promote the use of coaches, mentors, and tutors that help inculcate skills in goals setting that successfully account for both strengths and weaknesses.  
• Encourage external success coaching and tutors for additional help, and promote the development of these services if your institution does not have them.

 

By following these suggestions, your course will assist students with equitable learning environments, as well as being in line with the Principle of Engagement in the Theory of Universal Design for Learning.

The Princple of Representation - Guideline 2 - Language & Symbols

The first principle of UDL, ‘provide multiple means of representation”, help promote an inclusive learning environment on many levels.  When developing a course and focusing on this principle, there are three guidelines to follow.  They are

1. Perception
2. Language and Symbols
3. Building Knowledge

We are going to take a deeper look.

The second guideline, Language and Symbols, focuses on maintaining clarity about the content provided. How people interpret language or symbols can vary greatly depending on their frame of reference.  For example, a picture may have two different meanings depending differing cultural backgrounds. When content is provided in only one representation, inequalities may arise because not all learners share the same frame of reference. Part of supplying multiple representations is to clarify the content being presented.

 As you develop material be sure that you can meet the following criteria:

1. Clarify your terms such as vocabulary and symbols.
2. Support decoding mathematical notation, symbols, and other text.
3. Promote understanding across languages.
4. Address biases in the use of language and symbols
5. Illustrate through multiple media.

 By adopting this instructional strategy, more learners benefit. The alternative representations provided both promote accessibility as well as add clarity, and comprehensibility, for all learners.