Advice Not Given: Building Inclusive Professional Learning Communities Sue HardinThe critical need to effectively address diversity in the classroom means UDL is more vital now than ever before. Yet for some educators, getting started with UDL can feel overwhelming. How UDL leaders respond to the concerns of educators who are struggling during the Integration Phase of UDL adoption is critical to implementation success. We need to ask ourselves some important questions. Are we really listening and offering support when educators express their frustration with the complexities of UDL? Are we too quick to dismiss educators with a “Nope, it’s not UDL yet” when they are still learning about the framework? Have we created a “rockstar” mentality that feels exclusive and unwelcoming? In this collaborative session, we’ll explore how our implicit biases influence UDL adoption. We’ll examine ways to apply what we know about learner variability to build professional learning communities that harness teachers’ passions, celebrate educator diversity and capitalize on small, incremental change. Together, we’ll explore how professional learning, co-designed to honor teacher agency, and built with multiple on-ramps, provides all educators a path to UDL implementation.
Professional Learning Turned Inside Out Susan ShapiroLeaving one's school to attend a conference is the most common model for professional learning, but is it the most effective means for improving one's practice? Our work this year with educators in the
New Hampshire UDL Innovation Network has convinced me that there might be a better way --- get the sub, but stay at school! Based on the Instructional Rounds (IR) process developed by Elizabeth A. City, Richard F. Elmore, Sarah E. Fiarman, and Lee Teitel, our Professional Learning team at CAST has been facilitating a process that engages teams of educators in a self-study of school-wide instructional practices as one means for implementing the UDL framework. This modified-IR process has turned professional learning inside out! Unlike a traditional model in which an educator finds expertise at a conference, then works independently to set professional goals and implement new ideas to practice, this model supports
teams to find expertise, set goals, and implement new ideas by observing and analyzing their own work. Come here what CAST has been learning about professional learning.
Does your professional learning pass the coffee test? Sung ParkNew motivators and structures for modern professional learning may not necessarily be as effective as we assume. Sung Park shares insights learned from engaging educators in professional learning within Caifornia’s equity performance program that includes UDL Credentialing from UDL-IRN.
