Equitable Access to Education

As an English Language Learner, I can attest to how difficult getting my education was growing up. I did not obtain English proficiency until I reached the 5th grade.  I believe I can attribute my shyness as well to not being able to communicate with most of my peers or teachers and being judged for the way I would attempt to speak my very limited English.  I will never forget the teacher who on the first day of school asked us all to raise our hands if we do not understand English.  I was too embarrassed to raise my hand and say that I was one of those who did not really understand it, so I kept it down.  Even though she was a bilingual teacher, since no one raised their hand, she refused to do what a teacher is supposed to do and that is to learn and differentiate for any of us.  I almost failed that year, but I really tried my hardest not to because my parents were always very strict about school, and I was too afraid to fail.  I am looking at it through a different lens, however, because of my personal experiences, I believe it is very important to make education accessible for everyone.   

In my attempt to help with that accessibility as much as I can,  I created the following infographic that I can print and post or simply keep to help me with any visually impaired students I may have. It can also be useful if I am ever out for the day and the substitute can use it to still help the students, even with my absence.  

Image source: Author

The article The difference between Universal Design for Learning (UDL) and traditional education does a great job highlighting the differences between these two, and in that comparison you can see the importance and the serviceability of UDL and why it is so important for teachers to always remember to implement it.  You can see that it clearly makes education accessible to every student, whatever the need may be.  Technology is a great, modern tool that will help support that.  As it was mentioned in that same article, UDL attempts to build in flexibility that can be adjusted for every student’s strengths and needs.  I can’t help but to think how having this accessibility in the classroom with that teacher would have made my experience so much better, and I would have had access to the education I deserved to have. 

I believe that through my 10 years of teaching experience, I feel strong with providing freedom on how students want to demonstrate their learning.  I have done this when we do our Spanish Speaking Country Project.  They have the freedom to decide how they want to present their research, whether that is through creating a video, a slide presentation or any program similar to this, a website, a poster board, etc.  Providing accessibility, specifically with technology, is where I would still need to educate myself more.  As I have mentioned before, my experience and knowledge with technology is still very limited.  When I read about all of Google’s accessibility tools, my mind was blown as to how many things there are, and I did not know of almost any.  

Image source: giphy.com