Fall Training Update
From September through November of this year, UDL Project leader, Mallory Burton, visited each of the 7 UDL teams on-site to provide 2-day training on UDL principles and technology. Highlights of each on-site visit are listed below.
November 20-21, 2008: Nanaimo-Ladysmith School District
Teachers at Fairview Elementary School have been addressing the diverse needs of learners for years. They simply do not have a choice at this inner-city community school where a large number of students in each class require special assistance. This extremely dedicated group of teachers includes a teaching vice principal, learning assistance teacher, two grade 4-5 teachers, a 5-6 teacher, and a 6-7 teacher. The team’s application attracted the interest of the UDL project selection group because it was obvious they had already formed a solid team and because they had spearheaded so many initiatives, even technology initiatives, with very little working technology of their own. Students at this school had even created Accessible Books for the SET-BC collection with a borrowed mobile laptop lab. During the Kurzweil training for this group, as each new feature of the program was introduced, team members were instantly able to identify students in their classrooms who would benefit from using that feature. They began using SMARTBoards the day they were installed. The week after their onsite training, this busy team was already spreading the word about UDL, mentoring 25 other district teachers at a UDL Café which will meet on Mondays throughout the school year.
November 17-18, 2008: Courtenay-Comox School District
There may be world-class dinosaurs in the river out behind Arden Elementary, but there is nothing old-school about the teachers in Courtenay-Comox! Even before their onsite training, one grade 6-7 teacher had already contributed two lessons on Underground to Canada to the LOR. Another grade 6-7 teacher had figured out the Wii whiteboard hack on the Mac platform. A K-1 teacher had expressed interest in blogging with her students. The Courtenay-Comox team has grown in numbers as well as enthusiasm since their acceptance into the UDL project. The team now includes 2 learning support teachers from Arden Elementary and 1 from the high school, 3 grade 6-7 teachers, and two K-2 teachers. Some members of this team have already been using Kurzweil extensively, and the district boasts 90 networked copies! The district’s education technology specialist attended the Harvard UDL Institute two years ago and has already implemented many UDL strategies and technologies with this team. But despite the high level of technical expertise, some team members said they were feeling more like digital refugees than digital natives or immigrants after two full days of UDL training. A special ed director and school principal, also Harvard UDL Insitute alumni, and their tech support from Powell River also attended the onsite training.
Nov 4-5, 2008: Revelstoke Schoold District
The morning after Barak Obama was elected, the Revelstoke team started their day making a Wordle by pasting in the text of Obama’s acceptance speech. The Revelstoke team is the only secondary school currently involved in the UDL project. Their team consists of four teachers including a math, science, Social Studies/French, and English teacher. You might think that secondary teachers responsible for preparing students for provincial exams would have some reservations about the UDL philosophy, which allows for student diversity and encourages teachers to allow students to express what they know in a variety of ways. This was clearly not the case with the Revelstoke team, who commented that the UDL approach made sense and would serve as a framework to unite some of the other good teaching initiatives they were already using. In fact, the Chemistry teacher is interested in trying the approach taken by two Woodland Part Colorado chemistry teachers, who turned the traditional teaching paradigm on its head by presenting their chemistry lectures as homework by iPod and spending class time with their students on the problem sets.
Although secondary teachers would not be using the Class Profiling Tool to analyze the 100 or more students they teach, they did find it useful for analyzing their more challenging students. This team also recognized that Kurzweil would provide independence for many of their students. Two years from now, the Revelstoke School District is planning to build a new secondary school. It will be interesting to see how the UDL experience shapes their design of their new school and programs.
October 27-28, 2008: Vancouver School District
Although David Livingstone School was built in 1913, its teachers are among the most progressive in the province. They participated in an early SMARTBoard initiative, and they have already been using SMARTBoards for the past 6 years. Through their use of the SMARTBoard, the team has already developed expertise in the UDL principles of multiple means of representation and engagement. They joined the project to increase their repertoire of strategies for multiple means of expression, particularly in the area of student writing.
The team consists of 3 classroom teachers, an integration support teacher, a resource teacher, a teacher-librarian, and the school principal. This team collaborates by team teaching and by designing units, with the resource teachers and librarian supporting classroom theme development. During the UDL training, teachers in the project have been using the Class Profiling Tool on the CAST website to analyze the recognition, strategic, and affective strengths of three students.
This team elected to participate in a group to discuss the same three students. It was apparent from their discussion that all of the teachers had detailed knowledge of these students and that every student is every teacher’s responsibility in this highly collaborative school. Why is Rebecca wearing the crown? For identifying “ability to meet the needs of diverse learners” as the most import criterion in a rubric for teacher implementation of UDL
October 14-15, 2008: Prince George School District
October 9-10, 2008: Kelowna School District
September 23-24, 2008: Abbotsford School District
