Maker Experiment #2: Universal Design Modified

Universal: (adj.):including or covering all or a whole collectively or distributively without limit or exception; especially:  available equitably to all members of a society. (Synonyms: Comprehensive, All-embracing, complete)

This definition, according to Merriam-Webster.com, describes a term usually used for remote controls, language, emotion, or philosophy. It is not often used in education. CAST describes transforming education through a “Universal Design for Learning” (UDL) mindset. They discuss this as a “blueprint for creating instructional goals, methods, materials, and assessments that work for everyone” (CAST.org, 2013).

 Universal is such a big term that sometimes it is more useful for me to think about a synonym and plug that into the title of this teaching method. Comprehensive or All-Embracing Design for Learning. This should be how we approach every single lesson. One of the biggest mistakes that all teachers make, usually when in a rush, is to plan a “one-size fits all” lesson. As I have learned, these are always my worst days teaching. The “one-size fits all” approach will simply not work for our students and some students may shut down or find no relevance in the content simply due to the structure in the course. One of the most ineffective ways to teach is by assuming that all learners will learn at the same pace and in the same manner. This is where UDL is extremely important. Providing multiple ways to engage with the content and reflect the material is essential in this process. If done correctly, each student will have a personal connection and experience with the content to reach the desired objective.

This week in my CEP 811 class, we were asked to explore UDL and learn about the most effect ways to implement this in the classroom. The goal at the end was to view our Maker Experiment #1 Lesson through the eyes of UDL, then revise it to make the necessary adjustments and improvements. To understand how to do this, I first re-examine my lesson and took notes based on how well I met the UDL Guidelines 2.0. There is three main categories to evaluate lessons: 1. Provide Multiple Means of Representation, 2. Provide Multiple Means of Action and Expression, and 3. Provide Multiple Means for Engagement.

I was pleased to see that my lesson did provide a lot of these principles already, but I did find room for improvement. Here is my revised lesson:

MAKER EXPERIMENT #2 (MODIFIED UDL LESSON):

• As mentioned before: This lesson is created as a follow up to the previous Entrepreneurship lesson, but may be used on its own to facilitate learning of these concepts.

Procedure:

Bellringer: As students enter the classroom ask the: How do you know how many workers to hire? Does more workers always mean more output? (Students should write their answers in their notebooks before the class activity starts.)

ADDITION BELLRINGER: Show a clip of an episode of ABC’s “Shark Tank” in order to give students relevant “real-life” examples of the production questions they should be asking in order to cut costs and get their product to marker. SHARK TANK VIDEO (ADD: 7.2Optimize Relevance, Value, and Authenticity & 2.5 Illustrate through multiple media.

1. Students are in Inventors groups (5 students per group)
2. NEW ADDITION: Add: 5.2 Use multiple tools for construction and composition by showing a video (provide how-to use video recap (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rfQqh7iCcOU OR provide the HUMAN DRUMS Video as an example for potential use)
3. Each student must have a role in production/Conducting the charge
4. Students experiment to decide how many workers would be the best to maximize output.
5. Students start graphing:

• In the beginning we have our fixed costs (before we hire any workers).

i.     With 0 (zero) workers we get 0 (zero) output

ii.     Add one worker (labor)– Record data of output

iii.     Add another worker (labor) – record data of additional output

iv.     Add another worker (labor) – record data etc.

v.     Continue until all group members are laborers

• At this time, the addition of the 4th and 5th worker should be decreasing Marginal Returns and possibly NEGATIVE Marginal Returns (If not – continue adding workers with the entire class to show this principle)
  • If not doing the “Extension/Entrepreneurship project”, provide the HUMAN DRUMS simulation. Students must complete a simple beat in 1 minute (as many times as possible)
  • You might even try this activity with something like “Banana Bongos” or “Banana Space bar” and have each student have to add their hands on the banana.

MAIN IDEA: Eventually adding workers will decrease output because there is limited space and “Workers will be in the way of each other”.

5. Students work with group to discover what the ideal number of workers would be to maximize output.
6. Draw Graph and reflect on how we could hire more workers and keep the marginal benefits
   • Only way is to add more resources (more bananas, wires, connections, ect.)
7. Discuss findings and share results with class (include graph and chart)

ASSESSMENT/Debrief

• Students should discover the three stages of production: Increasing Marginal Returns, Diminishing Marginal Returns, and Negative Marginal Returns.
• Students should make a chart, graph and reflection on their experiment. In the chart it should look something like this: (The X-Axis will be # of workers, the Y-axis would be output/efficiency)
• NEW ADDITION: Add 8.4 Increase mastery-oriented feedback by giving students a reflection prompt that they will add to their “course blogs”. This is done to increase retention, encourage metacognitive approach to learning, and provide a formative check for assessing the objective. The question prompt will ask: What the correct number of workers are to maximize profits? And was the groups objective reached for the objective? This is also an addition of 9.3 Develop a Self-Assessment and Reflection.

Some of the UDL strategy guidelines that I was already achieving quite successfully in this lesson were: 3.1 Activating or Supplying background knowledge, 7.1 Optimizing Student Choice and Autonomy, 8.3 Fostering Collaboration and community, and 9.1 promoting expectations and beliefs that optimize motivation. The structure of this lesson is interactive and uses background knowledge because it is a follow-up lesson from a previous project. The entrepreneurship lesson gave students a creative voice and an opportunity to make a product. The lesson used groups of 5 students. This lesson will use the same groups and uses that knowledge to dig deeper in understanding of new concepts in Microeconomics.

UDL design has definitely improved this lesson. The biggest addition to this lesson is the self-assessment and mastery-oriented feedback assessment piece that I added through student blogging. Students’ blogging in the classroom can offer so many benefits that I am just now starting to learn. The options for collaboration are endless. In this particular addition students will be reflecting on their experiment, assessing what happened at each stage of production, and self-assessing their progress.

 

Blogging is also a phenomenal tool to show a formative check of learning. It is a way for students to reflect on learning and create a digital footprint of the experiences from the course. This will also provide for a way to create a course portfolio at the end of the course.

RESOURCES:

Public Domain CC0 (2014) “Blogging” [WEB IMAGE] Retrieved from: http://pixabay.com/p-327074/?no_redirect

CAST (January 6, 2010). [Video]. Retrieved from http://youtu.be/bDvKnY0g6e4

CAST. (2011). UDL Guidelines 2.0 – Organizer with links to examples. Retrieved from https://sites.google.com/site/udlguidelinesexamples/