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Learning and Creating with Read&Write

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In this first article of our new Inclusive Design series, we explore learning and creating with Read&Write, a literacy support tool that offers help with everyday digital tasks, including reading digital text aloud, understanding unfamiliar words, researching assignments and proofing written work. 

Tune into the video below for a walk through of the Read&Write Chrome Extension, including it’s features, my experiences with it, and this writer / educator’s thoughts on some of the ways that Read&Write can help individuals to gain understanding from the digital content they read, engage with the digital content that they read, and express themselves through their own digital writing.

Read&Write Tools / Features

Designed initially to help students to understand, engage, and express themselves with their digital reading and writing, Read&Write is just as useful for adults and youth, in educational and work settings, as well as for aiding individuals in achieving some of their personal goals.

Help students understand, engage and express themselves with Read&Write. Read&Write is a literacy support tool that offers help with everyday tasks like reading text out loud, understanding unfamiliar words, researching assignments and proofing written work.

Below are some of the reading, comprehension, and writing tools and features that Read&Write offers.

Reading Tools

These are a few of the tools that Read&Write offers to support users with accessing digital readings.

Text to Speech Reader

The Read&Write toolbar acts as a Text to Speech Reader, allowing you to listen to the text on your screen by pressing the play button, as well as pausing and stopping the reading. To help you in following along with what is being read, the sentence is highlighted in yellow and the word in blue.

Read&Write Text to Speech Reader in action.

The voice doing the reading and speed of the reading can be changed within the settings.

Audio Maker

By highlighting text and clicking on Audio Maker, Read&Write will create a Text to Speech audio reading of up to 10,000 characters of text, allowing you to listen to digital readings while offline and on the go.

Screen Masking

Clicking on Screen Masking will add a dark filter on your screen, with a light strip that moves with your cursor, to narrow your focus to the specific sentence or paragraph that you are reading.

Read&Write's Screen Masking in action.

Simplify Page

This tool creates a simplified page of the page that you are reading, free of images, videos, and ads. It also allows you to change the background and text colour on the page, the font, the size of the text, and the line spacing. In addition, it offers a Discover feature, which identifies keywords that readers might need help comprehending. By clicking these keywords, it provides a picture and a description of the what the word(s) refer to / mean.

An example of Read&Write's Simplify Page in action.

Comprehension Tools

Read&Write offers a number of tools to aid in research and reading comprehension, allowing readers to engage with the text that they are readings.

Dictionary

By highlighting a word and clicking on the dictionary, a dictionary description of all the uses and meanings of that word will appear in both audio and text form.

Read&Write Dictionary and Picture Dictionary response to 'mammoth'.

Picture Dictionary

By highlighting a word and clicking on the picture dictionary, a picture depicting that word will appear.

Web Search

By highlighting a word or phrase and clicking on the web search tool, a new tab will open taking you to a google search of that term.

Google search for 'mammoth'.

Translator

To see and listen to a word in a different language, in the settings, select the desired language for translations under ‘Speech’, and then click translate.

Read&Write's Translator tool sharing the word 'mammoth' in Arabic.

Highlighters

The Read&Write toolbar allows you to highlight text in a digital document in up to four colours and to clear those highlights at the click of a button.

Collect Highlights

By clicking the Collect Highlights tool, you can select which colour of highlights you would like collected, and it will collect those in a Google Document and include a link to the article that the highlights were collected from.

Read&Write's Collect Highlights in action.
Vocabulary List

By selecting the Vocabulary List tool, Read&Write will create a table in a Google Document with the highlighted words, their meaning, a symbol that represents them, and a column for you to add your notes.

An example of a vocabulary list created by Read&Write.

Writing Tools

Read&Write offers a number of tools to aid in the writing process.

Prediction

With the Prediction tool activated in the Read&Write toolbar while you are typing, it will offer a number of options for predictive text, helping writers with their spelling and tenses.

Read&Write Prediction tool in action.

Talk & Type

The Read&Write Talk & Type tool will type out the words you speak, when turned on, acting as a dictaphone.

Practice Reading Out Loud

By using the Practice Reading Out Loud tool, writers can read and record the text that they have written, and then listen to what they have read, in order to proofread their writing and catch any mistakes.

Uses of Read&Write for Inclusion and Accessibility

Read&Write offers tools that can aid everyone with their reading, reading comprehension, research, and writing, while at the same time offering solutions and workarounds for those that face difficulties and challenges with reading, reading comprehension, research, and writing.

Digital literacy accessibility with Read&Write.

Reading

For newer readers, individuals that struggle with reading, and those reading in a different language, Read&Write allows individuals to read-a-long with the text to speech reader, following the words being read aloud, being able to play, pause, and stop readings as they wish.

For those that learn better from auditory learning, that learn better while being active, who need to multi-task due to time constraints or need to limit their screen time, Audio Maker offers the ability to prepare audio files to listen to without the need of looking at a screen.

Read&Write's Audio Maker

For those that need to limit distractions while reading, Screen Masking, Text to Speech highlighting, and Simplify Page, all offer options for this.

For those that need the ability to manipulate their reading environment, Simplify Page offers this ability, allowing individuals to change text size, fonts, line spacing, and colour patterns to suit their individual needs and preferences.

Reading Comprehension

Whether learning new words, studying a new topic, or learning a new language, Read&Write offers readers the ability to build upon their vocabulary and understanding with ease. Read&Write allows readers to look up the meanings and uses of words in auditory, written, and pictorial form within the document they are reading at the click of a button with the Dictionary, Picture Dictionary, and Discover (within Simplify Page) tools. Readers can even build full vocabulary lists, curated to specific topics, using their colour coded Highlighters and the Vocabulary List tool.

For readers, reading in a new language, they can also use the Translator tool for the translation of words in audio and written format.

Research

Read&Write can aid in research by allowing researchers to highlight and colour code key pieces of information in their reading, and then curate and collect those highlights in a Google Doc with a link to the source using the Collect Highlights tool. Should the researcher wish more information on a particular topic, they can also use the Web Search tool to search terms with ease beyond the article.

Writing

Text Help character with a pencil.

Whether struggling with writer’s block or spelling, writing in a different language or simply needing a writing prompt, Read&Write’s Prediction tool can help with that.

And provided a writer is able to organise their thoughts in advance, Talk & Type can write up someone’s spoken words, aiding those that have challenges with typing or are in need of ways of limiting their screen time. It is also helpful for those unsure of how to spell a particular word.

Finally using the Practice Reading Out Loud tool after you are done writing, is highly useful in editing your writing, catching editing errors and disconnects in the flow of your writing.

Access Read&Write

Currently Read&Write is available for:

If you are affiliate with an educational institution, check with your institution as many have a license that allows for students and staff to use Read&Write at little to no cost. Additionally, Read&Write offers free individual plans to teachers.

Share Your Experiences with Read&Write

Have you used Read&Write? We’d love to hear of your experience with it. How do you use it? What do you find it useful for? Do you have any tips and tricks to using Read&Write?

Toolbelt Theory for Learning and Accessibility

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A trap that so many of us have a tendency to fall into is to try and help others by pushing our ideals and what works for us onto them. This can be particularly true in how we approach children, the elderly, individuals with disabilities, and those who are sick or injured; perceiving them as more vulnerable and in need of our help in making decisions for them. We forget that we are all individuals and that what works for us, may not work for them. Ultimately the only expert in what works for them is them (not you or whatever degrees and credentials you might have).

To listen to this article, click the red play arrow on the SoundCloud recording below:

Toolbelt Theory

Take for example, 3 carpentry students that are given a toolbelt. They might all start with the same toolbelt, but as they learn, experiment, and discover what works for them, it is not going to be long before each of those toolbelts are unique to each individual carpenter. This is the premise behind Ira David Socal’s Toolbelt Theory. While tools might be useful to us in performing certain tasks, how we utilise those tools and which are useful to us in the environments in which we work is very individual. Ultimately, in order to discover which tools will be useful to any one person, that person needs to know what is available to them and to have the opportunity to test the tools out in their environment, so that they can build a toolbelt that is useful to them.

Chico's well stocked tool belt from Chris Monroe's book Monkey with a Tool Belt
Chico certainly has a tool belt unique to him. Read on in Chris Monroe’s book Monkey with a Tool Belt.

Toolbelt Theory is based around the idea that as humans we are tool users, and that we choose tools most effectively when that choice begins with the Task at hand, and then considers the Environment in which that task must be performed, the Skill set of the individual (the tool chooser), and the Tools which are available. (Thus the acronym TEST).

~ Ira David Socal

Exploring Toolbelt Theory From the Perspective of Pain Management

As someone who has spent the last 9-years learning to manage pain and 5-years learning to manage post concussion syndrome, this makes a tremendous amount of sense to me. Key to what I have learned from the medical specialists, group pain management classes, and from my fellow patients is that what works for one person in their pain management, does not necessarily work for all. In teaching pain management to patients, medical specialists are essentially presenting patients with a number of tools (although in this case, we are not necessarily discussing physical tools) for managing their pain and asking the patient to experiment with the different pain management tools to figure out which methods of pain management work for them. In essence, each of us patients are creating a pain management toolbelt.

Avoiding the Pitfall of the Misguided Notion that the Educator Knows Best

The key here is allowing the individual to figure this out for themselves, which for whatever reason can be a hard for some educators to understand, perhaps due to the misguided notion that by limiting options, we are keeping things simpler for the student or saving the student time. I just need to look to my Masters to see examples of this. In asking the Accessibility Centre for help in finding ways of managing the online course readings without aggravating my concussion symptoms, I was presented with one solution – Read and Write Gold. Only after that did not work for me, was I presented with a second option on having real voice audio recordings made of my course readings. The latter helped but only with the course readings, for everything else I was left proceeding with extreme caution, walking a fine line with each course in not aggravating my symptoms too badly from all the online reading. And this leaves me with no solution for consuming online readings and research after I’m done my Masters. Fortunately in taking GDSE 584 on Universal Design for Learning and Inclusive Design and exploring the UDL Resource site, I am discovering a number of tools to navigate screen based devices to learn, research, consume content, and create content in a way that will minimise the aggravation of my concussion symptoms. Basically, instead of being given one bandaid of the brand and shape that someone else thought would work for me, I am being welcomed into a whole holistic clinic in which I am being introduced to the tools that are available, shown how to use them, and being left to experiment with them, in order for me to find which tools work best for me and in what way. Discovering these tools and recognising the possibilities that they hold has left me with such a feeling of relieve that I’ve actually cried.

Crafting My Toolbelt for Digital Learning and Creating

As I begin to create my own toolbelt for digital learning and creating, I’ve been reflected on who I am, how I learn, what my challenges are, what my strengths are, and where my passions and interests lie.

Personal Reflections on my Inclusive Design Action Plan Brainstorming Mind Map

To give you, dear reader, a bit of an overview of me as a learner, I am dyslexic, and manage chronic pain, chronic fatigue, and post concussion syndrome. I am also highly inquisitive, creative, a problem solver and an experimenter. I love storytelling, am discovering a new passion for audio storytelling, and am a biologist and educator by training. My main love in science is steeped in nature. Time in nature and with my cat are the two greatest calming influences in my life.

My current needs include:

  • mind mapping to organise my thoughts
  • tactile ways of thinking and organising
  • calming visuals that aren’t too loud
  • calming audio
  • natural voice readings
  • reminders to limit work and screen time
  • regular offline / calming breaks
  • healthy relationships
  • dimmed lighting
  • an environment in which I can control my work position, lighting and sound
  • audio recordings for remembering details from interviews
  • time in nature
  • cat snuggles

I am still fully immersed in TESTing (Task – Environment – Skills – Tools) tools with different tasks, but thus far, these are some of the tools that I am finding to be useful for me for my toolbelt for digital learning and creating:

Next up on my TESTing schedule for my toolbelt for digital learning and creating are:

In highlighting the individual nature of one’s toolbelt even when you have individuals with the same challenges, a colleague in my Masters also has post concussion syndrome and in asking him how he manages the online readings, he uses text to speech readers, which typically for me aggravate my symptoms. In addition, he also follows strict meditation practices, which is something that I find does help me.

Aiding Students in Building their Toolbelt for Learning

If toolbelts for learning are so individualistic, how do we as educators or parents help our students to build their toolbelts for learning, without falling into the trap of simply providing them with what we think they need?

What's in your toolbelt? What will help you reach your goals?
Image created with the aid of Vector Portal.

In contemplating this, this again has me reflecting back on my experiences with learning to manage my chronic pain, chronic fatigue, and post concussion syndrome in which the ChangePain Clinic, Complex Chronic Diseases Program, and Brain Injury Society of Toronto offered me different classes in learning to manage my conditions. While the classes introduced me to the tools and how they could be used, the homework in between the classes gave me the opportunity to test out tools in my own environment to see which worked for me and in what way. This is essentially what the TEST is in Toolbelt Theory.

To aid your students in creating their Toolbelts for Learning, teach them to TEST. Based on the Task they need to do, in the Environment that they need to do that task, with the Skills they have, have them try out the Tools that are available, so that they can determine which tools are the best fit for them and in which way.

Resources for Creating Toolbelts for Digital Learning and Creating

For many educators part of the challenge in aiding students in creating their toolbelt for learning, rather than simply telling students what tools / solutions they should be using, is taking the time to find what is available for their students to meet their various needs. Fortunately, Dr. Paul Hamilton has created the UDL Resource site to help with that.

A toolbelt full of digital tools for learning, creating, and exploring.
A Digital Toolbelt of Gwyneth Jones, the Daring Librarian.

One of our goals over the next few months with our StoryToGo Community Resources is to build a Library of Accessibility Resources and an open, self paced course in the StoryToGo Classroom on Building Your Digital Accessibility Toolbelt. In addition to this, we aim to create a video and blog series on StoryToGo giving people an overview of different accessibility tools and how to use them.

If you have resource suggestions for the series, library, and / or course, we’d love to hear about them in the comments. We’d also love any advice you might have on helping students to develop their toolbelt for learning.

Thanks so much!

~ Erica

Inclusive Design Action Plan

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One of the goals that has been important to me in studying my Masters of Educational Technology has been to gain a greater understanding and immersion in accessible digital design, and hence universal design for learning (UDL) and inclusive design. Tied to this, I wanted to gain a better understanding of disability thinking and language, as well as of systemic ableism. While promoting accessibility, equity, and diversity have long been central and important to my team’s and my storytelling at Ahimsa Media (a company founded on the concept of crafting media that is about creating around the notion of “love and peace on the road to harmony with your surroundings”), I have become much more aware of accessibility issues, as well as systemic ableism, inequities, and the treatment of marginalised groups since a car accident in 2013 that gave me new disabilities, changing my life and realities. This has made accessibility, inclusion, equity and disability storytelling central to my creative partner’s and my goals in our storytelling, course development, and digital design.

To listen to this article, click the red play arrow on the SoundCloud recording below:

This was so important to me that I both fought to get such a course included in my Master’s program and spent an extensive amount of time researching courses that would meet UBC’s criteria for it to be accepted as a credit into my Masters. For others searching for such a Masters course in Canada, while there are courses and self paced resources on accessibility, universal design for learning, and inclusive design that can be accessed online, I could only find two online Masters courses that fit my needs and desires – GDSE 584: Assistive Technology and UDL: Foundations & Exemplary Practices at Vancouver Island University and INCD 6016: Inclusive Art, Design and Communications at OCAD. I took GDSE 584, catching Dr. Paul Hamilton in his last course before retirement, and am incredibly thankful that I did, as this course and Paul’s resources made me aware of a number of resources that stand to improve both my students’ and my own life. In addition to GDSE 584, I have also taken ETEC 565C: Ableism, Equity and Educational Technology from UBC, which along with speaker training from RespectAbility, have helped me with gaining a better understanding of disability history, thinking and language, as well as of systemic ableism.

Art installation exploring What is Ableism. "Disability is not tragic."
Vanessa Blaylock‘s photo of Sun Cat Mellison’s installation What is Ableism?

For those of you looking for open and self paced study on Accessibility, Universal Design for Learning, and Inclusive Design, as a starting place, check out the resources below:

You can also discover my initial understanding and reflections on universal design for learning and inclusive design by visiting Exploring Universal Design for Learning and the Evolution to Inclusive Design.

As I have been working my way through GDSE 584, I have been doing so with crafting an Inclusive Design Action Plan in mind.

Crafting My Inclusive Design Action Plan

In crafting my Inclusive Design Action Plan, it is rather fitting that I was drawn to utilising a Mind Mapping / Illustrated Concept Building App called Concepts. The reason why this was so fitting is that mind mapping has played an enormously important role for me in my journey with dyslexia. It is a skill that a grad student, who I met with weekly in my first year of university, taught me to both organise my thoughts and my writing. I wish I remembered that grad student’s name, as by teaching me to mind map it is thanks to her that I learned to organise the many, many thoughts and connections that whirl around in my brain, helping to enable me to become a professional writer, communicator and storyteller.

A young Erica Hargreave of around 8 -10, performing a dance in a straw flat top hat tilted down over her eyes, with a cane, while dressed in a purple swimsuit and wearing soccer cleats.

And in this case processing my thoughts around creating an Inclusive Design Action Plan, you can see from the mind map below that they are many and varied, as I have been processing and reflecting on inclusive design in how it impacts my personal life, how I can implement it in my courses, and how to utilise it as I approach my storytelling and media creation.

Inclusive Design Action Plan Mind Map
Processing my thoughts on UDL and Inclusive Design as I develop my Action Plan.

Below you will find my Inclusive Design Action Plan for my personal life, course development and teaching, and storytelling and media creation.

Inclusive Design in My Personal Life

In addition to dyslexia, I am someone that manages chronic pain, chronic fatigue, and post concussion syndrome, post two car accidents. These, and particularly the post concussion syndrome have posed some challenges to me in approaching my Masters. Some of those challenges I addressed by finding a Masters Program that fit for my desired studies and was part time and online, allowing me to create my own pace at working through my studies. It should be noted here though, that in making a decision that was best for my health and self-esteem (in not constantly having to ask for special accommodations), I later learned that this meant I was unable to access the Canada Student Grant for Students with Permanent Disabilities as the rules surrounding make the grant inaccessible to students registered in part time studies programs. This is an example of systemic ableism in our Canadian education and student aid system that not only impacts students with disabilities that need part time studies, but also students that require part studies as they are caring for children or sick loved ones. I have tried raising these concerns with my MP and MLA, but those governing this grant federally point the finger at provincial student aid systems and provincial student aid systems point the finger back at the federal system, resulting in nothing being changed.

Personal Reflections on my Inclusive Design Action Plan Brainstorming Mind Map.
Reflecting on the personal side of UDL and Inclusive Design in my life.

With my post concussion syndrome, I asked for help from the Accessibility Centre as online readings were aggravating my concussion badly. This was met with being doled out, prescribed accessibility solutions one at a time, and only after I visited the Accessibility Centre in person to have my needs accessed. At which point I was told that the tools I was being given came at great cost, in the case of Read and Write Gold, which I have since discovered is not the case, and that only they could place the program on my laptop. Only after Read and Write Gold further aggravated my symptoms was I introduced to the next option of having my course readings read in real voices for me. This has been a good solution for me, but is limited to only the ‘officially published course readings’ and not to research readings, written materials within the course or engagement with my peers in the course, and offers for no on-going solution after I am done my Masters. In reflecting on this experience in the context of universal design for learning and discovering all the tools that Paul has introduced us to in GDSE 584, I have been feeling quite emotional. Not only was I treated in my Master, upon asking for help and expressing my needs, in a way that made me feel as though I was the problem child, but now that Paul has introduced me to the array of resources available and encouraged me to experiment and build a tool kit that works for me, I realise that could have had the resources to better balance pushing myself forward while limiting aggravations to the concussion symptoms all along. In moving forward, this is something that I need to take a moment to acknowledge and grief, as well as learn from.

For my personal Inclusive Design Action Plan, this means:

  • taking the time to research new / new-to-me accessibility tools
  • experimenting with those new / new-to-me accessibility tools
  • occasionally revisiting accessibility tools to see how they have changed over time, and if those changes meet my current needs
  • recognising what my current needs are
  • building an accessibility tool kit that meets those current needs

My current needs include:

  • mind mapping to organise my thoughts
  • tactile ways of thinking and organising
  • calming visuals that aren’t too loud
  • calming audio
  • natural voice readings
  • reminders to limit work and screen time
  • regular offline / calming breaks
  • healthy relationships
  • dimmed lighting
  • an environment in which I can control my work position, lighting and sound
  • audio recordings for remembering details from interviews
Two women lying in a tree
Cornelia Krikke teaching me about being mindful in the moment and grounding in nature.

I feel as though I am just beginning to discover all the accessibility tools available to me, but some of the ones that I have added to my tool kit thus far, include:

As I mentioned, this is just beginning of my experimenting and building my toolkit, but on my priority list are:

Implementing Inclusive Design into my Course Development and Teaching

One of the positive realisation in studying Universal Design for Learning has been discovering that much of the approach to Universal Design, through giving students choice and diversity in the manners in which the materials are presented, is how I have always been intuitively drawn to teach, along with empowering students to take ownership over their learning by getting them to develop and design projects of their choosing, that matter to them. In addition, with my own struggles with my post-concussion syndrome in my own studies, Lori Yearwood and I began to build fun and calming screen break activities into our online course to both remind students to take a health and wellness break and share some healthy digital hygiene with our students. We have shared those screen breaks as open educational resources on my speaking site under the category of Online Activity Breaks.

Course Reflections on my Inclusive Design Action Plan Brainstorming Mind Map.
Reflecting on my teaching and how I might apply UDL and Inclusive Design to my courses.

There are a number of areas in my courses that I could and should address to be even more inclusive in my course design and teaching. As I teach to very different students in very different venues, I will address some of those key teaching environments below.

BCIT

At BCIT, I predominantly develop and teach online, asynchronous (on your own schedule), credited courses for adults in the Broadcast Media and Communications Part Time Studies Program, although I do also develop and lead synchronous online summer camps for kids and have been asked to develop and lead in-person summer intensives for adults. All of my courses are project based with the subject matter of the project being up to the participants, with the hope that they will build the base for something of use to them in their future endeavours. These courses also involve students experimenting and reflecting on what they learn from both the course materials and their experiments, and how they will apply that to the continued growth of their project and / or future endeavours.

"together we create" street art
Image care of ‘My Life Through a Lens’ on UnSplash.

With my online courses, BCIT has now added an audio reader at the beginning of all of my course readings to allow the students to listen to the reading, should they choose to do so.

I have also discovered that BCIT’s Accessibility Services has created a new Adaptive Technology Lab that shares accessibility tools like Read & Write Gold, some of which are accessible to all students and staff, and others which students need to have registered with the Accessibility Lab to access through BCIT.

My action plan to make my BCIT courses even more accessible and inclusive, includes:

  • creating an optional ‘opening Unit’ on Accessibility in my courses with an overview of tools, so that students can review and put together their own accessibility tool kits
  • making the ‘opening Unit’ on Accessibility available to students before the actual course begins
  • giving students access to the course in it’s entirety from Week 1, so that students can work ahead when reviewing elements of ease to them, and spend more time working through the elements that present them with a greater time investment
  • updating each unit of each course to include a health and wellness activity break
  • as I teach things like digital storytelling, I’d like to add in digital accessibility spotlights into each unit, so that students are thinking accessibility and inclusivity in creating their digital content
  • adding natural voice audio recordings of all of the course readings
  • updating all auto generated captioning on course videos created by myself or my team to ensure accuracy in the captioning
  • ensuring that all imagery has properly done Alt text on it
  • the addition of weekly optional virtual sessions for discussion on the content, Q&As, and sharing of the content everyone is working on
  • a virtual hang out space in Spatial for students to use and connect when they wish with examples of past students work, like in this Spatial gallery that I built for the Interledger Foundation
Virtual Web Monetization Gallery in Spatial
Web Monetization Gallery in Spatial.

StoryToGo Classroom

The StoryToGo Classroom was designed with the idea of being able to provide more in-depth resources and learning activities to build upon our talks and workshops, as well as to provide clients with the knowledge and the skills to manage the digital storyworlds and communities that we build for them longer term. We also had the vision of this being a space to bring our varied community of storytellers, technologists and educators together to teach and learn from one another.

This teaching portal came through to fruition at the beginning of the pandemic, and as such has been used for other needs, in addition to the aforementioned ones, including synchronous online courses for kids and online teaching support environments for Ahimsa Kids.

Aside from the kid classes, a number of open, self-directed courses have been created in the StoryToGo Classroom to explore ideas in contemporary media and education, as well as craft and share health and wellness tools. Long term, we want to build a ‘health and wellness studio’ and ‘teaching resource centre’ on this site, along with our courses in contemporary media and private group classes.

In terms of universal design, our inclusive design action plan for the StoryToGo Classroom includes:

  • creating an open course on Building Your Digital Accessibility Tool Belt with an overview of tools, so that participants can review at their leisure and put together their own accessibility tool kits
  • creating an open course on Digital Accessibility Best Practices with professional development for digital storytellers and educators in mind
  • giving the students the ability to work through the courses in a manner of their own choosing
  • in courses relating to digital storytelling, adding in digital accessibility spotlights into each unit, so that students are thinking accessibility and inclusivity in creating their digital content
  • adding natural voice audio recordings of all of the course readings
  • updating all auto generated captioning on course videos created by myself or my team to ensure accuracy in the captioning
  • ensuring that all imagery has properly done Alt text on it
  • an invitation to the StoryToGo Facebook public and private groups to ask questions, discuss ideas / concepts, and share their work with the broader community
  • a virtual hang out space in Spatial for participants to use and connect when they wish with examples of community work, like in this Spatial gallery that I built for the Interledger Foundation
  • continue building wellness studio and resources
  • finding new ways within the courses to encourage engagement with the material, others going through the course, and the StoryToGo educators
Lori doing warrior pose.

With that last point on engagement, I have been experimenting with different discussion boards tools and forums, but haven’t found one that I like yet, and that does not attract in a number of spam bots. Should you have a potential solution, please share it in the comments below.

Ahimsa Kids

Ahimsa Kids is our set teaching arm, where we provide teachers to the film industry to help keep school age actors up to date with what their peers are studying in school. Typically this has us teaching in small environments with 1 – 3 kids at a time. While we have to stick with the work that is being studied in the classroom, the assignments laid out by each young actor’s classroom teacher, and to the production’s schedule, there are ways to approach this with universal design for learning in mind. In training our teachers in set teaching, a lot of it is about learning to read the student with empathy in mind, setting out choices in their day to know when to tackle the harder work with them and find spaces for more relaxed educational activities and inquiry, and creating engaging and enriched learning opportunities, where possible.

Interactive story building with kids in Elementari.

In terms of an inclusive design action plan for our set teaching, some of the ways we could be even more more accessible and inclusive, include:

  • creating a resource to teach my teachers about accessibility resources so that they are aware of accessibility tools that are available to them and their students
  • demonstrating for our teachers how they can utilise online set classrooms on the StoryToGo Classroom site to better support their students and aid them in their studies, both when teaching them in-person and virtually
  • setting up a professional development half day with our teachers to share accessibility resources, talk about effective use of virtual tools and spaces, and have each teacher share something from their own tool kit that they’ve found works well with kids on sets
  • introduce the option of setting up a Spatial classroom space, when teaching virtually, in addition to the zoom classroom and StoryToGo Classroom

Approaching our Digital Storytelling with Inclusive Design

Lastly, it is important to me that my team and I also approach our storytelling with inclusive design in mind. As we are cross-platform, interactive and immersive storytellers this means thinking about what inclusive design looks like to different forms of media from websites, to podcasts, to digital video, to augmented and virtual reality. Below, I share my initially thoughts on that pertaining to a few of our current mediums for storytelling.

Media Creation Reflections on my Inclusive Design Action Plan Brainstorming Mind Map.
Reflecting on the media that my team and I create and how we might apply UDL and Inclusive Design to our content creation.

Digital Magazines, Blogs & Websites

  • add natural voice audio recordings to all articles, blog posts, and pages
  • in the case of the natural voice audio recordings of articles and blog posts, our plan is to additionally share these as a pseudo podcast to attract new audiences to our content via audio storytelling platforms
  • ensure that all imagery has properly done Alt text on it
  • add a translation tool to the websites
  • on StoryToGo create a library of digital accessibility tools
  • create a blog post series on StoryToGo giving people an overview of different accessibility tools
The Pseudo Podcast, StoryToGo Reads, of read article on the StoryToGo site.

Podcasts

  • where possible record interview / discussion style podcasts with the Fireside Chat App as it creates a live transcript while recording, and offers a number of different ways to interact with the in studio recording of the podcast, including reaction buttons, sound effects, texting responses, verbally asking questions, as well as the option of recording with audio and / or video
  • the Fireside Chat App also provides downloads of podcasts in both video and audio formats
  • update and fix the auto generated written transcripts of podcasts both on the Fireside Chat App and when sharing to other platforms

Web Series, Films & Other Digital Video

  • update all auto generated captioning on videos created by myself or my team to ensure accuracy in the captioning, where this has not been previously done
  • when possible, film in multiple languages to make as inclusive as possible at the onset
  • transcribe captioning into different languages
  • create screencast videos on different accessibility tools to accompany the blog post series on StoryToGo

Augment Reality & Virtual Reality

  • with augmented reality storytelling, design to work with smartphones and tablets, to create for a more accessible experience than the glasses provide
  • with augmented reality storytelling, build in choice for audio and visual storytelling
  • craft mindfulness virtual reality experience
  • approach both augmented and virtual reality storytelling with steady camera and high film quality in mind to reduce the effects of VR motion sickness
  • design augmented and virtual reality storytelling with short chaptered storytelling in mind to reduce the effects of VR motion sickness

Being Mindful of My Own and My Team’s Wellbeing in Implementing Our Inclusive Design Plans

An artistic rendition of Mount Maxwell on Salt Spring Island as the Great Spirit Being.
An artistic reminder of Mount Maxwell from Season 1 of Naturally Ours and Hwiemtum’s words about connecting with nature for our health and wellbeing.

The key with thinking and approaching the various aspects of what we do in terms of universal design and inclusive design is not to be overwhelmed by it. Where we can approach new development and content with universal design and inclusive design in mind from the start, making the steps of approaching accessibility a habit and part of our content creation process. While also remembering that our own health and wellbeing is important too, so not beating ourselves up if we don’t get it all done on day one. Content can always be updated to improve accessibility later if need be, as long as we do not forget. This means training my team in this too, so I am not trying to do it all on my own.

Any Advice on Ways of Approaching Inclusive Design?

If you have any helpful tools or techniques for making your content more accessible with inclusive design in mind, then I’d love to hear about them in the comments below.

Exploring Universal Design for Learning and the Evolution to Inclusive Design

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In recent years, I have become increasingly interested in exploring Universal Design for Learning and its evolution to Inclusive Design. While I have always held a desire to make the courses, lessons and media that I create as accessible as possible, my newer disabilities from two car accidents have made me much more aware of accessibility issues in digital design. This has lead me to focusing some of my Master of Educational Technology work on exploring ableism, disability language and thinking, and universal design and inclusive design, so that I can both explore ways of challenging ableist thinking through my storytelling and improve the design of both my course materials and the digital storytelling content that my team and I create.

To listen to this article, click the red play arrow on the SoundCloud recording below:

Readings on Universal Design for Learning and Inclusive Design

To process my thoughts and understanding around Universal Design for Learning and Inclusive Design from readings and videos from:

… I invited colleagues, friends, and deep thinkers Lori Jones and Carrie Posner Sniderman to join me on an episode of the Encounters in EdTech Podcast to discuss and explore Universal Design for Learning and Inclusive Design. Tune in to that conversation in the video below or listen to the replay of the podcast on Fireside.

Exploring Universal Design and Inclusive Design in a Podcast Discussion

*Please stay tuned for the updated Closed Captioning, which will be available later this week. Current Closed Captioning is auto-generated and has errors that will be fixed.

My Reflections on Universal Design and Inclusive Design from the Readings and Discussion

Defining Universal Design for Learning

CAST defines “Universal Design for Learning as a framework to improve and optimise teaching and learning for all people based on scientific insights on how humans learn.”

For me Universal Design for Learning means creating with choice and accessibility in mind, so that students don’t have to ask for modifications; while at the same time creating a safe environment in which students know that they can come to the instructor should they need help or something different. This is important as every learner is different, meaning that we all have different needs, things we excel at and things we struggle with. Creating different options and pathways to learning makes sense, as it gives everyone the opportunity to excel.

Universal Design for Learning : flexible, straight forward, minimise barriers, consistent, supportive
Image care of Giulia Forsythe

This makes a tremendous amount of sense to me from my own history of experiences as a learner and with disabilities. In my young life with dyslexia, I learned that if I couldn’t achieve my goals one way (usually the way recommended in education), I just needed to find a different pathway to that goal and around whatever was creating the obstacle in my accomplishing that goal. Luckily I am stubborn and determined, so became very good at such problem solving.

Similarly as I have attended numerous medical programs to learn to manage my chronic pain, I have learned that what works for someone with a similar diagnoses to me, may not work for me, and what works for me, might not work for them. As a case in point, one fellow in my Masters similarly to me had post-concussion syndrome. In asking him how he was consuming the online reading, which were aggravating my concussion symptoms, I learned that he used screen readers, which were a helpful aid to him. Frustratingly for me, I struggle with screen readers, as they aggravate my symptoms and instead need natural voices. We did discover however that we mutually find mindfulness, breathing exercises, and meditation to be calming and to help manage our concussion symptoms.

The key here with Universal Design for Learning is remembering that there is no magic one size fits all. Rather the trick is in finding what works for you. As a teacher or designer, what this means is giving students options in learning and sharing what they’ve learned.

Accessibility : make sure that learning is accessible to all citizens
Image care of UNESCO Learning Cities

Framework for Universal Design for Learning

Universal Design for Learning is built around a framework of providing:

  • multiple means of engagement
  • multiple means of representation
  • multiple means of action and expression

Basically what this means is giving students choices – choices in how they engage with the course material and one another, choices in how students consume the course materials, and choices in how students share what they’ve learned.

Multiple Means of Engagement in UDL

As a teacher multiple means of engagement might mean:

  • discussion forums
  • ‘office hours’
  • scheduled group discussions
  • options of different tools for processing the course materials, like mind mapping or discussing over a podcast

Multiple Means of Representation in UDL

Examples of Accessible Communications, including aligning left, illustrating diversity, including captioning, adding Alt text to images, and using plain language. Everyone has the right to communicate as an individual.
Image care of Giulia Forsythe

What I am attempting to create in this post is an example of multiple means of representation of the information being shared. In this scenario, I am doing this by:

  • providing my reflections and learnings in written form
  • sharing audio readings of my writing
  • sourcing images via CC and Public Domain licenses that illustrate the ideas I’ve written about
  • adding Alt text descriptions to those images
  • creating a podcast discussion of the ideas shared here
  • making the podcast available in both video and audio formats
  • creating written transcripts of the podcast, available for download or as closed captioning (it should be noted that the initial version of this transcript is auto-generated, but will be updated to fix errors in the autogenerated transcript

Multiple Means of Action and Expression in UDL

Give students options in how they present what they have learned, with parameters, to make sure that they meet the learning goals.

Take for instance, the assignment that I am addressing with this post, we (the students) were asked:

Based on your understanding of UDL, and of why it is important to provide learners with a range of options, please explain, describe, and/or demonstrate how digital technologies might be used to provide learners with a range of effective options for: engaging with learning goals, learning tasks and learning materials, representing learning materials and information to learners, and showing and demonstrating what has been learned.

With the above assignment, we were told that we could present this in any way of our choosing, provided we shared it in a digital format that was included in a website and preferably embedded into that website. To help guide us, we were given the ideas of a slide presentation, multimedia presentation, or audio recording, but were not limited by those ideas, being invited to present in any other digital format that works well for us provided it could be included on a webpage.

As is illustrated above, Universal Design for Learning is NOT dumbing things down for students. Rather it is about empowering the student to take ownership over their education and build expertise in learning.

Evolution of Inclusive Design

For me, in this initial investigation into Universal Design for Learning, I wanted to explore a little bit further to discover what if any differences there were between Universal Design for Learning and the newer term I’ve been encountering – Inclusive Design.

As defined by the Inclusive Design Research Centre, “Inclusive design is design that considers the full range of human diversity with respect to ability, language, culture, gender, age and other forms of human difference.”

They stress 3 dimensions of inclusive design:

  • recognising diversity and uniqueness
  • ensuring an inclusive process and tools, meaning including individuals who have a lived experience of the “extreme users” the designs are intended for, respecting the edict “nothing about us without us”
  • encouraging the broader beneficial impact, beyond the intended user
A mixed community of people of different colours, genders, and ages - together and alone; walking, in wheelchairs, with walkers, pushing strollers, with guide dogs, with canes.
Designing inclusive cities, care of the Government of British Columbia.

While all of that sounds highly beneficial, I was skeptical that the term Inclusive Design was not simply tied to misunderstanding of Universal Design for Learning or perhaps a degree of ego, especially as the Inclusive Design Centre states that the “most important difference <with UDL> is that we do not need to design one-size-fits-all”, which in reading Universal Design for Learning: Theory and Practice and reviewing CAST’s materials is not the model for Universal Design for Learning either. In reading the “Why not use the term Universal Design?” section of What is Inclusive Design? from the Inclusive Design Research Centre and discussing with Lori Jones on the podcast, I am realising that this shift is not so much about Universal Design for Learning and Inclusive Design for Learning being at odds with one another in their approach to accessibility, but rather a move away from past misinterpretation of Universal Design for Learning as being one-size-fits-all model, based on the evolution of societal thinking towards disability and systemic ableism.

Given the above, the way I am interpreting Inclusive Design is the next step in the evolution of the aspects of Universal Design for Learning that focus on digital design, acknowledging the inclusion of all in our design thinking.

Person with multiple thought bubbles.

What’s Your Perspective / Interpretation?

As I stated above, both with Inclusive Design and the broader topic of Universal Design for Learning, this is how I am currently interpreting what I am learning about Universal Design for Learning and Inclusive Design from my readings and discussions. Do you have a different perspective or interpretation of Universal Design for Learning and Inclusive Design? If so, share it in the comments below.

Share Your Stories / Experiences with Universal Design for Learning and Inclusive Design

I would also love to hear about your stories / experiences with Universal Design for Learning and Inclusive Design in the comments below.

Wellness in Online Learning and Online Work on the Encounters in EdTech Podcast

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In our inaugural episode of the Encounters in EdTech Podcast on Fireside, we were joined by Mindfulness Coach Pamela J Alexander and Educator and Yoga Instructor Lori Yearwood as we discussed Wellness in Online Learning and Online Work, and Healthy Screenbreaks.

This is a topic that I am passionate about, as with having been met with a concussion while both working and studying online, it amplified the need for me to be conscious and aware of how I work and learn online, and what makes for positive experiences for me, as well as what is unhealthy for me.

Having been met with their own struggles, Pamela and Lori have taken what they have learned from building health and wellness breaks into their online learning and online work days, to build new careers around teaching others techniques in mindfulness, relaxation, and reducing anxieties. They share a little of that in this podcast.

You can find more of Pamela’s mindfulness teachings at pamelajalexander.com and teases to Lori’s healthy living, relaxation techniques, and anxiety busters on her instagram at @phoenixmoments and in this post about On the Go Mindfulness Activities on Roamancing. Lori is also one of the founders of StoryToGo, and the driving force behind the StoryToGo Classroom Health and Wellness Studio.

Encounters in EdTech is a podcast created by a collective of individuals in the edtech community, and hosted on Fireside.

Fireside is a new podcasting app that allows podcasters to record their podcasts with a live studio audience who can interact with the show. We broadcast live from Erica Hargreave’s Fireside Channel at https://firesidechat.com/ericahargreave.

Animals in the Great War eBook – a Sustainable Funding Case Study

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In March of 2019 we were fortunate enough to interview Maria Grazia Suriano, the researcher and writer of the eBook ‘Animals in the Great War’ for our Sustainable Funding Series for Media, Educators, Technologists, and Creators. Animals in the Great War is an open educational eBook designed to investigate the World War I and study its history from the standpoint of the animals that took part in it. In addition to the eBook, due to both necessity in crowdfunding this project and in observing what students responded, a number of digital photo and video storytelling pieces have been developed to compliment the eBook and engage students in this history in a manner that mirrors their storytelling preferences and that they respond with interest to. The target audience for the Animals in the Great War eBook are educators, history teachers, and students of history (high school aged and older). Below, we share that interview with insights into the Sustainable Funding Model that Maria and her team at Associazione Culturale Se utilized in funding the Animals in the Great War eBook, what Maria learned about crowdfunding, and how she will apply what she’s learned to future projects. Maria and I also discuss digital storytelling, teaching empathy, othering, breaking down borders, open education, and the Animals in the Great War eBook itself. Some of what we discuss here, Maria and her team at Associazione Culturale Se have gone on to apply to other projects, including her eBook ‘Percorrere la nonviolenza‘.

I’d like to be part of this different economy, this social economy. …. This is important. I don’t know how this could work in this all very capitalist world, but maybe this social economy could save us.

~ Maria Grazia Suriano, Writer of Animals in the Great War

Creators: Maria Grazia Suriano and Associazione Culturale Se

Country: Italy

Interview Date: March 28, 2019

Link to the Project: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/323612634_Animals_in_the_Great_War

Funding Method: Crowdfunding, Matching Funds Grant, Blood-Sweat-&-Tears

Interview with Animals in the Great War eBook Writer Maria Grazia Suriano

The Project : Animals in the Great War eBook

Animals in the Great War is a free eBook designed to explore the history of the Great War (World War I) through the stories of the animals from many different countries that partook in World War I – challenging the concept of borders, exploring othering, and instilling empathy.

This project, aimed at secondary school students and teachers, is designed to get young adults interested in learning about the history of the Great War (World War I) through the stories of animals. Stories like those of the pigeons in espionage, that cannot help but intrigue.

By learning about the war through the stories and perspectives of animals, it is hoped that it will encourage students to think critically about history, the construct of borders and othering, as well as instil empathy.

In the research, crowdfunding, and speaking on this project, it was recognized that it was not only the stories of animals in the war that were engaging students in this history education project, but the photo and video storytelling pieces shared in talks on and in the crowdfunding campaign. As such, stories within the eBook have been modified into smaller, more easily accessible storytelling pieces and shared via the Associazione Culturale Se’s blog:

Case Studies from Animals in the Great War

The Creators : Storytellers behind the Animals in the Great War eBook

The eBook ‘Animals in the Great War’ was researched and written by Maria Grazia Suriano, the co-founder of Associazione Culturale Se. Her colleague at Associazione Culturale Se helped with sourcing the images in the book and editing the book. A translator also worked with them to translate the book into English from Italian.

Maria Grazia Suriano is an independent historian, specialized on European history with a focus on identities, cultures, borders and ways to cross them.

In 2016 Maria cofounded Associazione Culturale Se, a non-profit organization with the aim of spreading inclusive knowledge and enhancing the subordinate subjectivities often excluded from institutional narratives. The Associazione Culturale Se’s focus with this is on promoting history education from the twentieth century, revolving around themes of desire,  empathy,  possibilities, responsibility, affectivity, differences, diversity, and solidarity. In doing this they offer courses and workshops in history education, and create educational history resources for use in the classroom, like the eBook Animals in the Great War and the accompanying Case Studies on their website. The organization’s funding plan is based on public financing, but as this is scarce the organization offsets its financing by offering editorial services, and Maria offsets her income as a copyeditor, yoga teacher, and translator.

Road to Funding Sustainably

As mentioned above, the Associazione Culturale Se in the past has looked to public funding to finance their projects. In the case of the Animals in the Great War eBook, however, they embarked on a new funding journey by entering their eBook into a funding competition with the Europeana Foundation. The competition, Strike a Match for Education was a Matching Fund, designed to encourage co-investment between public and private institutions and the crowd. In this case, for each 1 EUR donated by the crowd, Europeana contributed 1 EUR up to a maximum of 100 EUR per donation and no more than 3,500 EUR per project, once the campaign achieved its minimum crowdfunding goals. To apply, the project had to be digital, use Europeana openly licensed content as a central element and be relevant to a secondary education audience (students 11-18 years and teachers).  Europeana was also looking for scalable and present ideas that would work across multiple countries and/or languages.

Three projects, including the Animals in the Great War eBook were approved for matching funds, and then entered into a crowdfunding campaign to raise the public portion of the funding on Goteo.

What is Goteo?

Goteo is a crowdfunding platform based in Spain which focuses on projects that generate a collective return through promoting the commons, open source code and / or free knowledge, creating as they call it, a social economy. They’ve coined themselves as the open source crowdfunding platform.

Some of the distinctive features of Goteo are:

  • its requirements of openness for the projects, which need to contribute to free culture or the commons in some manner;
  • enabling participants to contribute as volunteers for the projects, in addition to with money;
  • it is run solely by a non-profit foundation, the Spanish Goteo Foundation, enabling tax deductions for donations;
  • its code is free/open source and it has an open API; and
  • it enables other sources of income for projects by partnering with public and private institutions to run match funding competition and allowing successful projects to carry out a second campaign round to raise more funds.

Lessons in Crowdfunding

For Maria and her team at the Associazione Culturale Se this was their first crowdfunding experience, and they realized they were wholly unprepared for it.

It’s naive to approach crowdfunding without a network and digital strategist / strategy. You need to be prepared. A good idea is important, but it’s not enough to be successful in this social economy.

~ Maria Grazia Suriano, Writer of Animals in the Great War

With hard work and creativity, the Associazione Culturale Se were able to meet their minimum goal of 3,000 Euros with the matching funds from Europeana, which covered the cost of the eBook being translated into English from Italian. To help in reaching this goal, they utilized creative commons photographs from World War I and created video shorts with those images on the service of various animals in the war.

Maria and her team learned a lot about crowdfunding in the process, including:

  • that their project needed someone with experience in digital strategy, storytelling, and crowdfunding;
  • that (at the time of their campaign at least) crowdfunding is better suited to an international project and team, as the concept of crowdfunding was all very new to the Italian public; and
  • you need to be prepared and have a plan, as a good idea is not enough.

This also broadened their horizons on the potential of digital storytelling in education, in recognizing how their youth audience was drawn to the photo and video storytelling pieces they created as a part of the crowdfunding campaign. These digital storytelling pieces drew the young people into wanting to discover more about history, and ultimately got them questioning borders and thinking empathetically about those impacted by war.

Other Funding Streams

The Associazione Culturale Se had hoped to gain the support of an animal organization in the campaign, but unfortunately were not able to garner this. Maria suspects this was because they were too small as they had not begun to build an audience before the start of the campaign.

Future Building

While not as successful with funding the Animals in the Great War as they would have liked, Maria and the Associazione Culturale Se did learn a lot, and found that the idea of becoming a part of a social economy really resonated with their sensibilities. This is something they wish to explore more on future projects and even crowdfund again. Just next time they will be better prepared by approaching crowdfunding with an international project, with an international partner, a plan in place, and someone with digital strategy, storytelling, and crowdfunding experience to take the lead on that aspect of the project. They also learned that a book is not enough, and want to delve into other mediums and forms of storytelling to engage the students in history.

As they further grow a social economy around their project, they’d love to see companies with similar values to theirs be a part of making their work sustainable through sponsorship.

Culture Has to be Free

One of the fundamental believes of Maria’s and the Associazione Culturale Se’s is that culture needs to be free to make information accessible. One of biggest problems that teachers face is that they don’t have the money to buy the resources that they need. This problem does not solely sit with educators though, but also with learners. Many people don’t have the possibility to continue with their formal education after public schooling, making it important that they have something to think on, something different than a school book.

It’s important. Culture has to be free … at all levels, because many people have no possibility to continue after school. It’s important that they have something to think on … something different than a school book.

~ Maria Grazia Suriano, Writer of Animals in the Great War
Have a question for Maria? Ask it in the comments below, and we shall see if we can get you an answer.

A enormous thank you to BCIT for sponsoring this case study, to Grant for the Web for funding the broader Sustainable Funding Series, to the AMTEC Trust Award and CNIE for funding my professional development work around this work, and to David Porter for acting as an advisor to me in this work.