Universal Design for Learning (UDL)
While there are several legal requirements for online lessons to be accessible to students with visual, auditory, or mobility impairment, more is needed to make digital learning truly accessible to all students. Universal Design for Learning (UDL) is a framework for designing learning technologies that seeks to support struggling students and those with cognitive or behavioral disabilities as well. Following is a summary of the article Universal Design for Learning: Scanning for Alignment in K-12 Blended and Fully Online Learning Materials by Basham, Smith, and Satter. The evolution of K-12 education includes greater proportions of online learning content, whether through completely online schools, hybrid classes, or brick-and-mortar classrooms relying on laptops and software to deliver some of the content. Creators of digital curriculum already make certain accessibility modifications, such as providing closed captioning and transcripts for sound files, alt text descriptions f...