Krista Ott - Using Technology to Enhance the Implementation of UDL

Krist Ott,  is a curriculum coordinator with San Bernardino County Superintendent of Schools in the ESS Department which is our Educational Support Services Department. Krista is here to share information with us about her expertise in Universal Design for Learning, and how she uses technology to enhance the work she's doing to support educators within the county with implementation of the UDL framework in the classroom. 

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Transcript

Krista_Ott

Sonal  00:03

Welcome to the SBCSS Digital Learning Bits and Bytes Podcast inspired by our dedication for equitable and inclusive educational technology and computer science. Today's digital learning team hosts are Sonal Patel and Jessica Bocher. Hello, everyone. I'm Sonal Patel.

Jessica  00:21

And Hi everyone. I'm Jessica Boucher

Sonal  00:23

We'd like to begin by introducing our special guests Krist Ott,  a curriculum coordinator with San Bernardino County Superintendent of Schools in the ESS Department which is our Educational Support Services Department. Krista is here to share information with us about her expertise in Universal Design for Learning, and how she uses technology to enhance the work she's doing to support educators within the county with implementation of the UDL framework in the classroom. So welcome, Krista. 

Krista  00:53

Thank you. 

Sonal  00:55

Okay, let's start with a bit of fun. We always like to have fun. Please share one bit or bite that people may be intrigued to learn about you.

Krista  01:04

All right. Well, I don't think I'm all that intriguing. But personally, I do like to redecorate. I like to tear rooms apart in my house. I like to play with colors. I like to redesign what things look like, much to my husband's dismay. Wow, I love that little side of me.

Sonal  01:22

Oh, wow. So we're the total opposite. Just to let you know, it's wonderful that you have this talent, but it's my husband. Usually that does all that he goes to visit those model homes just so you can get some ideas on decorating you and you and him when would definitly get along.

Krista  01:35

I do watch a little bit too much of HGTV. And my husband will say nope, nope, turn it off. Don't get any more ideas. I'm done. No more projects.

Sonal  01:44

Yeah. No. How about you, Jessica,

Jessica  01:46

I'm the same I'm with you. Sonal, my husband's the one that has that eye for design. I admire that you have that. Because it's just something that I, I wish I wish I could you know, go to a store and see paint colors and be able to see how that would turn out in the actual space. Our colleague, Dr. Chan has a great artistic eye for things like that. So I'm sure you too, can can talk about your projects.

Krista  02:14

I'd love to get together with her. Absolutely. So I can give her a paintbrush, and she can get going on my house.

Sonal  02:20

Yes, exactly. So thank you for sharing that bit of information about you. You We always love, love learning about the individuals we network with and work with, of course. And so with that, we'll just take it forward with the next question.

Jessica  02:34

Absolutely. So can you start us off by explaining the principles of universal design for learning, otherwise known as UDL, and how they promote student engagement and agency?

Krista  02:46

Yeah, I'd like to actually step back just a little bit and talk about kind of my progression in my career because I came to universal design from some of my other layer of my other layers of education. So firstly, I started off way back when 33 years ago, and in teaching and learning, where we looked at multiple intelligence from gardeners, and so I was like, oh, that's brain based research. And so then from there, I became a certified gate teacher, we use the icons, kind of the visualization of students being able to organize their thoughts, and get their thoughts down on paper, like, what's the brain doing? How am I thinking it was an individual representation of them doing that. And then so from there, I went into thinking maps where I was like, Oh, this is great. This is that brain researched type of teaching, learning for our students, where again, there's visual representations. And organizations only this time, they layered on the eight  cognitive ways that our brain thinks in school. And so that was just another layer. And then I came into Universal Design for Learning where I was where it was really taking all those pieces that I had learned about the brain before. But now it was on an individual basis, it was meeting the needs of individual students, not kind of what we do collectively, with our whole group. But now I'm giving you some choices, some autonomy in the way that you're thinking. And Universal Design for Learning allowed me to do that. So let me get back to your question. You were saying like, what are the principles of universal design for learning and help promote student engagement in agency? So I really like to say and give a shout out to CAST because everything that I have learned for through UDL has been by going to trainings with CAST and listening to Katie Novak. So this information comes from a lot of different places. So I do want to kind of give that shout out there. But it's really again, going through that brain research is knowing that we're goal driven. Our nervous system is goal driven. And so that connects to that brain research, right? And so, knowing this, how So as to think about the teaching and learning three principles of UDL, those three principles being engagement, representation, and action and expression. And those three principles of UDL really connect to three distinct geographical areas in our brain? Do you want to know what the three ideas? So the the first principle really is engagement that's really at the center of our brain. And it really is helping us to connect to students, how do I get them engaged in the learning? How do I recruit their interests? How do I convince them that this is something that you want to learn, when you come to my table, I need to figure out what you're interested in, and how I'm going to get you connected to the learning through your interests. The second one really is representation. And that really is kind of at the back of the brain. And it is really connecting into, you know, that recognition network, and that is how do we take in information? How do we consume information? How do we make meaning of the information that you're giving me, and we know that all students don't take in information and process it the same way. So we're really starting to think about that with that, that second principle or that representation principle. And then the third, the third. The third would be action and expression. Like once we know that our students know it, understand it, and can do it. We want them to prove it to us. But we don't want them to prove it to us in the same typical traditional way of a multiple choice test, or here's a couple of essay questions. And the test is not my best way to perform or show you what I know. So we want to give them lots of ways to show us what they know whether it's acting out going back to those multiple intelligences, right? It's about acting out, or can I can I do a presentation? Or can I write it in a poem or it doesn't matter. But you can show to me that you know, and understand what I wanted you to learn. Right?

Sonal  07:11

Absolutely. Right. So exciting. As a student, I just remember when I was back in the classroom, and just sitting there give being given the task of writing those reports, the same reports in every single one of our classes, and just kept thinking, you know, what, if there was another way that I could demonstrate this, you know, I know we didn't have the luxuries of technology back then. But there were still ways to do that. Right. We could have acted it out, we could have collaborated with someone and worked as a team on it. So I really appreciate you saying that there's just so many ways that UDL could be effective with our students,

Jessica  07:44

And really tap into their passions as well. I remember being in fifth grade, and I had to do a state project and my state was on Florida, I still remember it. But there were a lot of different writing prompts that we had to you know, make sure that we were able to speak to and research. And I remember sprucing up my report, I had my title page and I put these like ribbons, I glued ribbons around it. And then I three hole punched it and I tied it with yarn. I think I even added like little balloons. I went very creative. Yes, I was thinking outside of the box, but I would be one of those students that would be like, let me make a, you know, like a three dimensional poster or let me do something more like expressive than just this project where I'm writing and creating this, this book, essentially, where I could still hit all of the prompts, but I could post them and show them in a display type way.

Jessica  09:07

I like how you you started off with your your journey. And you're saying, you know, I I had exposure to gait and icons and thinking maps and visual representations. But UDL was so different than that, because UDL you had said is on an individual basis, right?

Krista  09:24

It allowed me to take what I knew my own prior knowledge as an educator, and use that as my base, my foundation, and then think about it intentionally through, oh, wait a minute, all students aren't the same. Like why would we ever think that all students are the same? And one lesson is going to work for all our students. It's kind of an aha. And I think the first time I started to really realize that is when I had a fifth grade student during a social studies test come up to me and said, I wish that you had asked me this because they knew everything about this part of The American Revolution. But you didn't ask it. And then he went on to say everything that he wanted me to know. And I was like, he really knows everything that I asked. And he could just speak it to me. But I didn't ask it. I didn't give him that opportunity to show mastery there. I just assumed he didn't study and didn't know what I was, you know, he didn't know the material. He knew the material better than I could have ever hoped for. I just didn't ask it the right way.

Sonal  10:29

That's a great example. So you've kind of alluded to this, but I know you want to speak a little bit more about it, Krista. So how does UDL promote equity and accessibility for all of our students?

Krista  10:40

So I like to I will let me just start with saying UDL is the acronym for universal design for learning. And so what we have to do with our mind shift with educators is to not think about us as planning a lesson, right? We're designing lessons. And I think that's where my love of creating things at the house comes in is like, Oh, if I can think about myself as a designer, I think through things things in the beginning, right, I want to know, in my mind how everything is going to lay out. And so really, I start to think about if I'm going to redesign something in my house, my goal is to paint my family room. Great, but what are my barriers? Like? How can I get that job done. And so I have to start thinking about, well, I have to move my furniture, I have to get the right color of gray, I have to think about getting dropped cloths down. Like I just don't pick up a paintbrush and start painting. And so I have to think about here's my pathway, here's my goal, this is what I want to do. But how do I get the job done? How do I get to that end in mind, right? And so when I start to think about what are those barriers to getting the job done, I start thinking about options, oh, I could use plastic cloth, I could use a sheet and old sheet that doesn't fit anymore, or, but I'm thinking through before I get into the middle project and find out like, Ooh, this is not going the way I had intended to. I pre planned out beforehand. And so in that frame of mind, when we start thinking about accessibility and equity for students, it's really knowing our students, first of all, and then knowing our standards and our curriculum. So where exactly are we going? And how are we going to get our students there, knowing that many of our students have variability, and not that one pathway is going to work for all those students. So I have options. And so I think about my painting my my walls Gray, I need a paintbrush, I need a roll or I need an edger. I know I can't paint my corners the same way I get to paint the flat part of my walls.

Sonal  12:53

Right? Yeah, that's a really great analogy. It takes me back to one of the Katie Novac analogies where she uses the the party, right? You go to a party, what do we need for that party that would cater towards all of the guests that are at that party? Right? What what food options do we need to ensure that every every person's dietary rich restrictions are met? So it's kind of similar to that? Yeah. And Jessica and I are working often with educators and thinking about that, even that hyperdoc template, where, you know, educators are planning lessons based on the learning design, learning design model. And we you know, during that process, we're being proactive, rather being proactive rather than being reactive. Later, we're thinking about our English language learners, we're thinking about our students with disabilities, would you say that is kind of like, you know, that is aligned with the UDL model, we're really considering all of our learners and what barriers might be present. And then we're ensuring that within that design, we've given all the resources necessary to ensure their success.

Krista  13:52

And not just resources, but options, options are like we want our students to have choice in in the way they get there. You may be a student who likes to read text, and highlight text, I may be a struggling reader, I don't want to read texts, like that turns me off right away, I'm overwhelmed. I'm frustrated. I'm struggling through the cognitive lift of reading, and I'm not understanding the content. So then maybe I want to get onto a video or I want a choice board where you've vetted some things for me where I can, you know, flip through magazine or through a website. And if I'm gleaning information in my own way, I'm just not doing it through text. And so I think when we talk about accessibility for all is that we're meeting the needs of the variability in our classroom for those students and giving them choices that work for them so that they can be successful and that is equity. Right?

Sonal  14:50

That is definitely equity.

Jessica  14:52

And I like how you you said I'm painting my walls Gray. I kept listening to your your analogy and how You were saying, you know, we're not planning we're designing. And I was saying is she going to change the color? Is she going to change the color. And so listening through that, I noticed you kept the same color throughout your analogy. And so that would be like the standard, we're still teaching them the grade level standard. We're just proactively removing those barriers. So if the standard is gray, we want that outcome to be gray. So we're not watering down the content. We're just removing barriers that might be in the way of the students being able to access the content.

Krista  15:33

Removing those barriers or scaffolding. So when we talk about our standards, is we know the goal in mind is that grade level standard, the some of our students need scaffolding into our standard. And so sometimes that's the little mini lesson or that's a small group instruction, I'm going to pull a set of kids forward and like the bearer is that they don't have prior knowledge or experience with multiplication, how can I take them from single digit multiplication, to jump into double digit multiplication? So that might be the barrier, because they're, you know, they need to do this as their standard as a fourth grader, that they might have missed something in third grade. So my job as a teacher is to reach back, provide that foundation, scaffold them in so that they can have success with their grade level standards. But yes, the color stays the same, the goal stays the same. 

Jessica  16:27

And that was an amazing, amazing analogy. So talking about removing barriers, how can we use technology? I know you're a fan of Wakelet. And and other platforms that are technology based? How can we use those to implement UDL? Could you share a couple of examples?

Krista  16:45

Sure. And so Wakelet, I do like wait, look, and just that one first, because that's what you asked about. I stumbled onto Wakelet. for, with a colleague of mine, where we had some students that struggled with reading grade level material, and how could they access that material and still get the same content, but it was the piece of text that I wanted to use, I didn't want to go down a different Lexile or grade level, I wanted him to experience the same text that everyone else was. So I needed to find ways for them to have that opportunity. And so I dropped a piece of text into wakelet. And there's a lot of other tools in wakelet, for organization. But this is the one I specifically liked. I dropped that piece of text into wakelet. And students were able to change the size of font, like this is what matches me I need a bigger font. We used to do irlin overlays way back in the day, don't know if you remember those. But those are those color screens that you would lay on top of a piece of text that was either yellow or blue or green or pink, you remember those in kids would say, Oh, the words aren't swimming on the page anymore. And we would test them like what color do you need to use. And so wakelet actually has the same colors in it. So you can put a color text over the words. So the words don't swim on the page for those kids. If a kid is reading one of those pieces of text, and they come across the word they don't know, because the Lexile level might be too high, they can hover on that word in a dictionary pops up. And the dictionary is either gives the definition but also gives a picture of that word. And I also liked that you can change some of the texts highlight some of the texts in different colors or the font to show parts of speech. Here's your nouns. Here's your verbs. These are adjectives. So you can really point out to some of those kids parts of speech that they might need to be more aware of, in breaking down what does this text really mean? The last thing I like about wakelet is they can take that piece of text and translate it into a different language. 

Sonal  18:55

Absolutely.

Krista  18:59

So wakelet is a really valuable tool for scaffolding kids into appropriate grade level material, if needed.

Jessica  19:07

And you had said prior, you know some some students, they get overwhelmed when you give them text, right think oh my gosh, this might take me a really long time. And you know, it just makes that threat heightened with that assignment. And so I really enjoy that you found the resource in wakelet to be able to remove some of those barriers and get the students engaged and know that there are ways to overcome and like you had said you didn't want to use the lower Lexile we still want to give them the grade level content but there's ways around it that we can help and utilize and so leveraging wakelet for that is absolutely a great resource. Because typically you know I use wakelet to store some of my my websites that I want to save or different things that I don't necessarily want to keep bookmarking on my toolbar on a computer. So utilizing wakelet, in that way for students is extremely powerful. So I appreciate you sharing that with us.

Sonal  20:09

So yes, I am a huge fan of Wakelet, I have many, many friends who will be really excited to hear you talk about it in such a way, Krista, there are so many more educational technologies tools that you know, that I can think of that would also be so beneficial when we're thinking about Universal Design for Learning. Is there anything else you would like to add or share regarding utilizing Ed Tech with UDL?

Krista  20:31

Yeah, absolutely. I think a lot of UDL is having, again, going to options and choice choices. And so I started to think about choice boards, right. And so some of the things that I do with choice boards is I want students to do some research and inquiry. And a lot of times that is online, I want them to go into certain sites that I have vetted, that I know are safe for kids. And so in that I will sometimes use Symbaloo. And so I'll have a Symbaloo set up for social studies or science. And I will have sites that are dependable and vetted by me that I know I can get some kids to go in, and they're practicing a little autonomy, right? I'm taking control of my learning. And I am picking and choosing what I want to learn. But I have put up some safeguard parameters in that. So I do like Symbaloo for that. 

Sonal  21:22

I'm going to share a story. Okay, that's similar. So on my way to St. This year, I happened to be sitting next to the CEO of Symbaloo. Wow. And he was on the plane and he's like, are you going to the same conference design? I was like, yes, he's like, Have you heard of Symbaloo. And I could not believe that Symbaloo was still around. Because, you know, I think it was about eight years ago that I started using Symbaloo when it was at its very basic level. And he got his laptop out and started showing me you know what it how it's evolved? I could not I was really amazed by that.

Krista  21:52

The other thing I like about it too, is that you can actually search a topic area and add someone else's Symbaloo page to yours. And so it's a very collaborative way to work with other teachers, absolutely specific content areas, which I love.

Sonal  22:09

So yeah, that just reminded me that sorry. 

Krista  22:13

No, I love it. I love it. Because you're right. Symbaloo is in a kind of an old tech tool.

Sonal  22:18

It is, but it's coming back in, 

Krista  22:20

I think it's coming back. Because on our phones, we're so used to our tiles that we tap and open. And that's kind of like instinctual to us. And so when we see it on the computer, we're like, oh, I just tap in, I go right straight to my site. I don't have to search it in the search bar. So I kind of like that for our students.

Sonal  22:39

Exactly. And before we go to the next question, I think it's important to say like, this is where our worlds are connecting. Now you're out there in ESS we're in Digital Learning Services and we're increasingly seeing the benefit of utilizing technology for all of these different options. And for removing barriers for our students. There's just so much out there. I mean, if you think about Immersive Reader in itself, the number of things immersive reader can do you know, and we can use it, we could also use that now. So you know, widely in different platforms like Flip.

Krista  23:11

Wakelet, Wakelet. Reader, Canvas, I use Canvas a lot. It has Immersive Reader in there. And that is another tool that I like to use because it is tapping now into we learn through digital learning, or distance learning, I should actually say, distance learning is that some of our students really excelled in that environment. And we never really addressed that before. And so some of those students who do well in an asynchronous environment, I still want them to get the content, but I'm allowing them to get it in their space. And at their pace.

Sonal  23:48

Absolutely.

Krista  23:49

And so with that client canvas, I can set it up so that students have prerequisites, they have to do some initial learning before they get into the learning, they have to do the before the during, and the after phases of learning. But in that I can also, you know, give them activities, different links, articles, videos, text to read, I can give them an assignment, a quiz or I can engage

Sonal  24:14

them in conversation, you're personalizing the learning experience. And

Krista  24:17

they can do it by themselves or they can engage with others in it. And so really now you're starting to tap into all three principles.

Sonal  24:25

Yeah, I love it. Thank you.

Jessica  24:27

Thank you for sharing those valuable tech tools and different platforms. Canvas, Symbaloo, Wakelet. There's countless others that we won't continue to list. So our final question for you is what advice would you give a teacher who's new to implementing UDL in their instruction?

Krista  24:50

So I think I would start off again, like I have to repeat know your students know your standards know your curriculum. You have you have to know that I would also say start small. Whenever we start, you know, mine has been a progression of 33 years, taking the best of what I've learned and building on top of it. And I would say for new teachers in UDL, or tech tools is small steps, take it, take it slowly, get comfortable with one piece, either one technology, one principle, combine them together. And really, you get feeling comfortable and confident in that, because not only are you getting comfortable and confident with it, so are your students, you know, they're kind of on this journey with you. And then I would layer on maybe another principle, or maybe I stay with that principle. And I add on another tech tool, they have to get used to this new way of learning. And so it's not something you can jump in, dive in and expect to feel success, you'll be stressed, they'll be stressed. And I think that's setting yourself up for failure. So play with it, feel comfortable with it. And go from there, I hate to say that, you know, you have to feel like you have to do everything just because it's new. We all, we all learn in small chunks, and are successful that way. So I would say small chunks toe dip in and have fun with it.

Jessica  26:19

That is great advice. And I love that you bring up the fact that when a teacher starts utilizing UDL and emphasizing choice and student agency, that this is probably a new way of learning for the students too. So sometimes people will start and they're like, Wow, this is really chaotic, or it's not going well. And then they might just be tempted to revert back to like, whole group instruction or the way that they were doing things. So I really like that you say, you know, the kids are learning along with us. And just just keep trying, start small.

Krista  26:55

I would also say that our students nowadays, they were born with technology in their hands like that, you see, you see kids in strollers, swiping and pushing and navigating quicker than our parents do. And so for us as teachers, we have to change the way that we teach our students, because we're meeting them where they are. And that's their strength, right. And so we have to utilize technology and changing the way we shift our teaching. Because they're hardwired differently than we are I think nowadays. And so we have to meet them where they are not vice versa.

Jessica  27:36

That is a great thing to note, because it's absolutely true. So thank you for bringing that to our attention. We have learned so much from you is there any PD that you may be offering or ESS is offering so we can continue to learn from you and learn about this topic.

Krista  27:53

We actually do have universal design for learning in Canvas an asynchronous course, two part series, the first one being universal design, the foundations of so that we can think about the basics that we need to know about Universal Design for Learning. And then the second course is also offered asynchronously in Canvas, utilizing our tech tools Sonal. Again, going ahead, and we're doing some lesson design with that. 

Sonal  28:21

Excellent.

Jessica  28:22

And when will those be coming out? 

Krista  28:23

Those will be coming out in December the first part and it will run for about three months. And then we'll open up the second lesson design because the first foundations is a prerequisite to the design, you really have to have that before you have understanding of the second piece. So one is kind of like the what and why. And the other one is the how now how do I apply it to what I'm doing?

Sonal  28:41

And then the other thing I just remembered also, which might be really aligned to all of this work is the accessibility course in Canvas that is going to be coming out sometime at the end of this year. Yes, I know. It's gonna be a surprise, Jessica, but you want to tell people a little bit just give them give them a little sample of what that might be about?

Jessica  29:07

Yes. So DLS is working on an accessibility course that is going to utilize the principles of UDL, but really highlighting the educational technology side of things to help proactively remove barriers for students who do all students actually are going to benefit I remember Christa showed me a cartoon where there are students waiting at the bottom of stairs and there's a picture of the guests, custodian or teacher or principal, whoever the person might be shoveling the stairs and then you have a student who's in a wheelchair, waiting for the ramp to be shoveled. And he asks the the adult Okay, well can you can you shovel the ramp because I can't use the stairs. And the response is well after I shovel the stairs Then I'll shovel the ramp. And the aha moment is if you shovel the ramp, we can all use the ramp. So that's the thing that we want to bring with the accessibility course is showing that this is something we can utilize educational technology to just help all of our students and remove barriers for all students and the way that they learn. So that'll be coming out at the end of the year. And it'll be offered through Canvas, which Krista was talking about the platform Canvas. So it'll be something that is asynchronous and available and helpful to all

Sonal  30:34

absolutely. And, you know, I'm just gonna just throw in computer science here as well, because that's the beauty of UDL, it can be aligned with every content area, right. And so in the computer science world, what we're doing is we're planning professional developments for our seasons of CES model, which is part of the big educated workforce investment grant, and we're planning to create a, we actually are just going to evolve the course that we currently have, and do more around Universal Design for Learning in computer science, so that we can start to think about how we're gonna be more culturally responsive and computer science so that we can get more interesting, you know, from all of our students that our students do stay in and do consider these types of careers when they leave the classroom. But it's about our teachers, our computer science teachers being proactive when they're thinking about current computer science learning models. So very excited about that. And with that said, we want to thank you so very much for this valuable, valuable information. Krista, it's been such a pleasure having this conversation with you today. The work that you're doing is so inspirational. Honestly, it really is. And we learned so much from you, Jessica, and and so to Theresa, and what we want to do is do you mind if we just share your email address real quick, and we'll make sure we put it on the note. Absolutely, actually do want to do want to tell everyone your email address?

Krista  31:49

Sure. christa.ot at SP CSS, that's Christo with a K R I S T a.ot ott.

Sonal  31:57

Awesome. Thank you so much for being here.

Krista  32:01

Thank you for having me.

Jessica  32:02

Yeah. So we really appreciate it. And I am really taking with me that it's not less than planning. It's less than designing. So thank you so much, Christina. We appreciate it having you today.

Krista  32:14

Thank you, sir. Pleasure.

Sonal  32:16

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