I have spent a lot of time learning about Inclusive Education and Inclusive Design while completing a Special Education Certificate recently. My main takeaways from my learning are that fairness is not equal, but rather it is equitable, and that we cannot do this alone – we need to have people in our lives who are able to help us see our strengths, and support our struggles. 

I really appreciate Shelley Moore’s work on Inclusion and how it solidifies that there is no ‘average’ student. Everyone belongs as their own unique individual, and as such, ‘average’ simply shouldn’t exist. If we aim to reach the students who are struggling or require extra challenge, then we will definitely meet the students who are on the middle of the road, whereas if we aim to reach the middle, we will surely miss those on the outside (Moore, 2016). Check out the video here! The figures below (Moore, 2016) depict the road that has been travelled to get to where we are with inclusion, as well as where we need to go to appreciate and celebrate the diversity we all bring with us to the classroom and the world.

Our Interactive Learning Resource connects so well with Inclusive Design as we chose to create a Professional Development workshop based on the idea of Inclusion in the General Classroom. My essential question was looking at how teachers can create an inclusive classroom where all student needs are met, which led me to think about self-advocacy and communication skills. In order to meet student needs, teachers and students need to know what they are! By teaching our students about self-advocacy and how to communicate their needs (Lee, n.d.; Reader, 2019), we can help them to feel more comfortable and confident in asking for help when they need it. Our resource includes areas for discussion and a specific activity based on learning how to ask for what we need; in this way, our resource works to develop skills that teachers can explicitly teach their students to use to ensure they are receiving the support they need. Keeping that in mind, teachers should already be implementing strategies in their classrooms to support their students! There may be times, however, when students feel they need more help and these self-advocacy and communication skills will become quite beneficial.

A universal design in engineering that I immediately thought of was automatic door buttons. They were originally designed for people who use wheelchairs, but they have benefitted many others as well – hands full with groceries, carrying something heavy, pushing a stroller or cart. The act of removing the barrier and making the world more accessible for some, was actually beneficial for everyone. This relates very well to creating learning designs, as we need to focus more on addressing barriers before they occur rather than fixing them after the fact. In this sense, the more we can build inclusion into our designs, the more access we are creating for learners. Scaffolding learning is a great example of removing barriers and creating accommodations. If we chunk learning into smaller, easier to manage components, then we can dig deeper into our understanding (IRIS Center, n.d.) – this can be done by pre-teaching pieces or adding extensions to different tasks based on learning needs. By including these scaffolding pieces, you are removing the barriers for students who require more support, as well as adding components for students who may need more challenge – in other words, ensuring you have the automatic door buttons available.

References

IRIS Center. (n.d.). What is Instructional Scaffolding? Retrieved from https://iris.peabody.vanderbilt.edu/module/sca/cresource/q1/p01/

Lee, A. M. I. (n.d.). The Importance of Self-Advocacy for Kids Who Learn and Think Differently. Retrieved from https://www.understood.org/en/friends-feelings/empowering-your-child/self-advocacy/the-importance-of-self-advocacy

Moore, S. (2016). Transforming Inclusive Education. [Video]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RYtUlU8MjlY

Reader, M. (2019). Setting Students Up for Success through Self-Awareness and Self-Advocacy. Retrieved from https://www.foothillsacademy.org/community-services/parent-education/parent-articles/setting-students-up-for-success