Universal Design for Learning (UDL) aims to provide equal opportunities for all students to learn by acknowledging that individuals have different brain networks and learning styles. UDL encourages teachers to use multiple teaching methods and tools to engage the varied ways that students learn best. Assistive Technology (AT) refers to technologies that help students with disabilities perform tasks. Incorporating AT gives students with disabilities a better chance to succeed by decreasing barriers to equal education access. Examples of AT include computer programs that aid visual/hearing impairments and technologies that support physical disabilities.

1. UDL & Assistive Technology
http://cast.org/udl/indec.html

2. What is UDL?
 Universal Design for Learning
(UDL) is the criterion for
curriculum growth that provides
every individual with the same
opportunities to learn.

3. UDL: Implications for Education
 UDL explores three brain networks that access a
variety of skills in each individual. These brain
functions are different for each person and help to
decipher how we all learn in different ways.
 By acknowledging and understanding these
differences, educators can better grasp how students
learn.
 By accepting these varying learning styles, teachers
can plan lessons according to their students’ best
teaching styles.

4. Implications continued…
 By using an assortment of learning tools that tap into
your students’ differing abilities, teachers can better
reach each of their students.
 The flexibility embedded in the principles of
UDL, encourage teachers to employ a plethora of
learning techniques and strategies in an effort to tap
into each student’s most effective way of obtaining
new information and applying it.
 As a result, education can be far more differentiated!

5. UDL: 3 Brain Functions
http://cast.org/udl/indec.html

6. What is AT?
 Assistive Technology (AT) refers to the
variety of technological resources
available to students with disabilities.
 The different technologies allow
students with disabilities to perform
tasks that would likely be very hard or
impossible to otherwise achieve.

7. AT: Implications for Education
 By incorporating technology that can help
students with disabilities, these students will
have a far better chance to succeed.
 Technologies associated with AT include, but
are not limited to wheelchairs, mechanisms
that support physically disabled
students, computer programs and resources
that aid in accessing information in new ways
that can reach students with visual and hearing
impairments.

8. Implications continued…
 By using adaptive technology in the classroom and
beyond, students who have been pushed to the side
in the past will have the opportunity to succeed.
 These technological accommodations allow students
with disabilities to decrease the gap in receiving an
equal education as their peers.
 It is a teacher’s responsibility to understand and
implement these technologies so that ALL students
have equal access to education!

9. Examples of AT
http://www.loftonspace.com/

10. Key AT Tools (Microsoft Users)
 The ribbon from Office 2013 has all
of the commands used in the
program.
 Users can use shortcuts by pressing
a few keystrokes instead of using a
mouse to navigate.

11. AT Tools Continued…
 For the visually impaired: Shortcuts allow
you to zoom in to get a magnified
image, allow you to use speech activation to
control functions and to hear written text
read aloud.
 For English Language Learners, there are
ways to hear foreign texts translated aloud.
 For the haring impaired: Shortcuts allow
you to view SmartArt graphics.

12. 2 Additional Resources
 Assistive Technology and Universal
Design for Learning: Two Side of the
Same Coin.
http://craigcunningham.com/
 Free Technology Toolkit for UDL in All
Classrooms.
http://udltechtoolkit.wikispaces.com/

13. References
 “CAST: Universal Design for Learning.” CAST: About
UDL. CAST, Inc, 1999. Web. 11 Apr. 2013.
http://cast.org/udl/indec.html.
 “Assistive Technology.” Wikipedia. Wikimedia
Foundation, 30 Mar. 2013. Web. 11 Apr. 2013.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Assistive_technology.