Universally Designed Curriculum
UDL
As recently as the early 1990's, the Center for Applied Special Technology (CAST) came up with the notion of applying the idea of "universal design" to education. Universal design was that concept of making public buildings accessible to people with physical disabilities by incorporating designs to meet the needs of diverse users rather than just tacking on a ramp here and there. CAST brought the same idea to educational curriculum by advocating designing curriculum for diverse learners right from the beginning, and not just tacking on an accommodation here and a modification there. According to an article in the Nov/Dec 2002 edition of Teaching Exceptional Children, "building a curriculum with inherent flexibility helps teachers maintain educational integrity and maximize consistency of instructional goals and methods, while still individualizing learning.
The key features of UDL are:
goals
materials
methods
assessment
and the key words for UDL is
flexibility
appropriate
supportive
malleable
For more information, see CAST's Teach Every Student website.