Keynote workshop: Joelyn de Lima

Chair: Dina Mehmedbegović Smith, University College London, Institute of Education

Leveraging Universal Design for Learning: Creating Inclusive Digital Material

Ensuring inclusive and equitable quality education is one of the 17 UN Sustainable Development Goals. As educators, both formal and informal, the choices we make have the potential to increase or decrease inclusivity and equitability in education.

Universal Design for Learning (UDL) grew from ideas about making architecture more accessible. UDL focuses on eliminating barriers through initial designs that consider the needs of diverse people, rather than overcoming barriers later through individual adaptation. It has three main principles: providing multiple means of engagement, representation, and action & expression.

In this workshop, you will be introduced to the principles of Universal Design for Learning (UDL), and discuss incorporating these principles to support the learning needs of all your students. You will also have the opportunity to practise making your digital materials more inclusive.

In addition to educators, this workshop will be beneficial to anyone who makes and shares digital materials (for policy/communication etc.).

To get the most out of this workshop, please bring your laptops, and any digital material (MS Word files, PDFs, PPTs) that you share with your students/audience.

Learning Objectives:
By the end of this workshop you should be able to:
- Describe UDL, and the three principles of UDL
- Justify the need to make your materials more inclusive
- Modify your materials to make them more inclusive.

Leveraging Universal Design for Learning: Creating Inclusive Digital Material (90 min)

Joelyn de Lima, EPFL, the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne, Switzerland, Switzerland