Preparing for the Fall Semester: Aligning Instruction to Standards

The 21st century classroom is highly diverse. Finding a way to ensure that all students can meet rigorous educational standards can be challenging. The Universal Design for Learning (UDL) framework, however, can help educators align their instruction with academic content standards. 

In a 2006 article by Browder and colleagues, the authors suggest that educators require three types of information. This includes foundational knowledge about academic content, covering understanding of the academic standards, domain specific knowledge for the subject being taught, and evidence-based practices for teaching. Next, educators need good examples of how to teach academic skills that link to state standards. Finally, educators require guidelines for developing instructional plans and Individualized Education Programs (IEPs) that target educational standards. In their article, the authors present a seven-step process that incorporates aspects of UDL to evaluate standards and build alignment with classroom instruction. 

In their article, the authors present a seven-step process that incorporates aspects of UDL to evaluate standards and build alignment with classroom instruction. These steps include:

1. Identify the academic domains around which planning will occur;
2. Identify the appropriate state standards for a student’s grade level;
3. The special and general educators should work together to identify typical materials, activities and contexts around which learning will occur;
4. Plan alternate achievement targets for students who need them;
5. Review content to ensure that what has been created for a student maintains high quality and reflects the standard;
6. Enhance learning activities by incorporating instructional methods to strengthen student learning, such as UDL, assistive technology, or evidenced based practices;
7. And, finally, identify the important skills a student must learn that cut across several standards and make these skills a focus of the student’s IEP. 

A 2016 article by Rao and Meo provides another model for linking instruction to educational standards more closely aligned with the UDL framework to address learner variability. According to Rao and Meo, the first step educators should take is to “unwrap” a standard. This process involves breaking down a standard to identify the skills that students are expected to demonstrate, on one hand, and what students are expected to know, on the other. The required skills within a standard are often denoted by words that describe what a student must be able to do. Then, a teacher considers the concepts, knowledge and background information that a student will need to know to develop those skills. 

Once the standard has been unpacked, educators can then apply the UDL framework to the goals, assessments, methods, and materials they will use while teaching. In this way, teachers can ensure lessons both align to rigorous educational standards, such as those found in the CCSS, while also taking into account student variability.