Accessibility

First of all, we have been fully participated in universal design for learning last year, I found that UDL is much easier to be implemented with online instruction, compare with traditional face to face manner. Apparently, online education enables sharing and storing in any time, it is more accessibility. When I think the education manner deeper, here comes a main big concern, would UDL lack of communication between educators and learners? Especially, even if almost everyone has a convenient accessible microphone and camera, educators still hardly get overall feedbacks. That may significantly reduce the maximum size of class scale.

After reading, I found that this kind of problem itself is not a UDL problem, it is a technology problem. We already have various powerful technology tools supporting our communication, besides that, virtual reality, augmented reality could be some even more powerful decent technology providing multiple means of actions and expressions. “Images, graphics, animations, video, or text are often the optimal way to present information, especially when the information is about the relationships between objects, actions, numbers, or events. …”; “Sound is a particularly effective way to convey the impact of information, which is why sound design is so important in movies and why the human voice is particularly effective for conveying emotion and significance. …”(UDL review) However, there is challenge typically faced by educators, would educators lose their enthusiasm in UDL?

 

Equality

Inequalities is unavoidable, UDL is not able to consider every single person’s situation, but what UDL can and its most significant benefit is openness. For example, for learners with visual disabilities or those who are not familiar with the type of graphic being used, there should be some replacements like e-learning using sound as its main education method. It is inequal to shift the responsibility of inequalities away from educational institutions.

 

Conclusion

Comparing with traditional physical education which already exits for thousands, UDL still need a significant time to improve itself. The critical part is that who has the power to create UDL, that is closely connects to equality and accessibility. There are two broad approaches to open education for now: “empowering individuals and groups within existing structures and transforming the structures themselves in order to achieve equity. Critical approaches to open education focus on the latter, seeking to reframe open education to be participatory and emancipatory, as well as being more accessible. Those advocating critical approaches to open education seek to expand access, including the concept of access, but also to further justice.” (Cronin’s (2019))

 

  References

 

Cronin. C. (2019). Open education: Walking a critical path. In D. Conrad, & P. Prinsloo (Eds.), Open(ing) Education: Theory and Practice. Leiden: Brill. Open Access Version – http://eprints.teachingandlearning.ie/4345/

 

http://udlguidelines.cast.org/