Joanne

I loved the Nail activity. It was helpful because I was able to experience the frustration that my special ed students feel every day. I was able to overcome it, but my students are not always able to do that. This activity helped me to remember that I must strive to present information in a less frustrating, easier to understand, manner.

I plan on doing this activity with all of my classes on the first day of school. I will post a NAILS poster in my classroom and on my website.

I aspire to design the program to allow more special education students to succeed. I will begin this process with creating a pre-assessment which will identify strengths and weaknesses of the the student. This will provide valuable information which I can use to incorporate any neccessary skills based activites in the program.

There are 3 UDL Principles 1. representation 2. action and expression 3. engagement The 9 guidelines follow the principles. There are checkpoints for each principle.

The individual checkpoints have links to resources Ex: [] online graphical dictionary

This will be very helpful to incorporate variability in lessons. Another way to achieve variability to learning, is to ask the students, "How would you like to learn this?" Students need to be given an equal system of learning opportunities and different strategies to gain expertise.
 * Variabilty**

Present information and content in different ways. Differentiate the ways that students can express what they know. Ex: use graphic organizers and rubrics Stimulate interest and motivation for learning. Start with the WHY we are learning this.

=Minimize BARRIERS = =Maximize all learning OPPORTUNITIES = = = head phone splitter Start-to-Finish books Raz-Kids.com (leveled books)
 * Technology **

Wiki Spaces - use for book reports  literature circles

Time for Kids - can use for Science

Teach Me- Kindergarten Firefly Discovery Education

Flowcabulary- Curriculum in Hip Hop form

Livescribe pen