Personalize Learning (#plearnchat)

In this interview you will learn about UDL and how the principles of UDL could be used to help all students understand their own learning. Envision using the UDL principles to help learners understand how they learn and how to personalize their learning. 

Universal Design in Learning (UDL) is about providing instruction and the appropriate tools to all learners so they are successful in meeting their learning goals. Personalized learning is all about the learner and starts with the learner. There seems to be some confusion about what UDL is from the perspective of personalized learning.

Q7:  Why is UDL necessary for all learners? 

When any student understands how they learn, they are empowered to take ownership of their learning. This opens doors in having tools and resources that can help them become independent learners and motivated in learning, in and out of school. It also opens up windows of opportunities for learners to appreciate their aptitudes, talents and gifts and for teachers to guide and nurture them in the learning activities and projects.

Who are Expert Learners? 

"1. Strategic, goal-directed learners. They formulate plans for learning, devise effective strategies and tactics to optimize learning; they organize resources and tools to facilitate learning; they monitor their progress toward mastery; they recognize their own strengths and weaknesses as learners; and they abandon plans and strategies that are ineffective.

2. Resourceful, knowledgeable learners. They bring considerable prior knowledge to new learning; they activate that prior knowledge to identify, organize, prioritize and assimilate new information. They recognize the tools and resources that would help them find, structure, and remember new information; and they know how to transform new information into meaningful and useable knowledge.

3. Purposeful, motivated learners. Their goals are focused on mastery rather than performance; they know how to set challenging learning goals for themselves and how to sustain the effort and resilience that reaching those goals will require; they can monitor and regulate emotional reactions that would be impediments or distractions to their successful learning."