Using the UDL Framework Individualize Scaffolds and Performance Criteria

Once a teacher has interpreted and refined the true purpose of a standard and reframed it as a classroom goal that allows for multiple methods, the next step is to set the level of challenge appropriately for individual students.

In order for learning to be successful, the performance criterion should relate to learners' particular recognition, strategic, and affective networks. If the demands on these networks are too great, students may become frustrated and are likely to learn little. On the other hand, a performance criterion that doesn't sufficiently tax these networks fails to provide the challenge necessary for growth. When students can complete tasks without thinking or working, boredom and disengagement are right around the corner. Vygotsky's (1962) concept of the zone of proximal development characterizes the ideal challenge as a level just beyond easy reach, but attainable with scaffolds or help from others. Faced with an insufficient challenge, students can complete a task without thinking or working; faced with too much challenge, students have little incentive to stay engaged.

Research supports the positive effects of deep engagement that creates a sense of total involvement with a task. Csikszentmihalyi (1997) calls this state "flow" and explains that it's only possible when the level of challenge is just right:

Flow tends to occur when a person's skills are fully involved in overcoming a challenge that is just about manageable. . . . When goals are clear, feedback relevant, and challenges and skills are in balance, attention becomes ordered and fully invested. Because of the total demand on psychic energy, a person in flow is completely focused. (pp. 30-31)

This state of flow is also noted by Malone (1981) in his studies of video games, in which the challenge escalates as players develop skill, so that they're always playing just above their current level of competence. The video game Lode Runner, for example, includes more than 100 levels, with each level slightly harder than the level beneath it. Mastery of one level opens the door to the next; the difference between successive levels is small, presenting a highly motivating challenge. This same kind of incremental challenge can foster engagement in the classroom. To adjust performance criteria appropriately, we should look to students' strengths and weaknesses in recognition and strategy, as well as their preferences.

So far, we have seen that deriving clear goals from standards requires teasing out the central purpose of a standard by separating the goal from the means for attaining it, restating the goal in a way that is attainable for all students, and then individualizing the pathways to the goal and performance criteria for measuring success. Let's see how one of our classroom example teachers might follow this process.

Setting "Universally Designed" Goals

Mr. Hernandez is faced with a new social studies standard calling for students to learn characteristics of the 50 states in the U.S. by studying one state in depth. The suggested benchmark for students at his grade level (6th grade) is that they be able to write seven paragraphs about that state. Mr. Hernandez's class includes one student designated as mildly mentally retarded, two brothers who recently arrived from Africa and speak very little English, a student who spends half of his day in a residential psychiatric institution, and two students with language-based learning disabilities (one of whom is Patrick).

To derive a clear goal from this standard that will be suitable for everyone in the class, Mr. Hernandez takes the following steps:

1. He identifies the standard's chief purpose. This one is designed to measure students' knowledge of specific content (U.S. states) and also their ability to carry out specific strategic processes: finding, organizing, and presenting information.

2. He derives a classroom goal that accommodates this focus: "Students will collect and organize information about one state into a coherent presentation that must have some text but can also include images."

3. He considers the barriers to recognition, strategy, and affect inherent in existing materials and tools and selects additional resources to help students overcome them. Because some of his students have difficulty reading printed text, he decides to make all textual resources available digitally and let students use software that reads the text aloud. He also provides materials at different reading levels.

4. He fashions the parameters of each student's assignment, the scaffolds available to each, and the performance criteria based on individual differences in recognition, strategy, and affect. For example:
   • Students struggling with recognition barriers in traditional materials will use digital text materials with text-to-speech and collections of digital images, while those with recognition strengths will be encouraged to assemble their own resources.
   • Students with strong writing skills will write a number of paragraphs about their state, with the option of including pictures and other media. Less adept writers will use on-screen templates to design presentations based primarily on pictures and sounds.
   • Students who require greater challenge to get them engaged will be asked to create longer and more in-depth pieces and perhaps use a medium completely new to them. Students needing less challenge will be asked to create more modest pieces and will take advantage of templates and pre-assembled resources.

Although all Mr. Hernandez's students will be pursuing the same goal-researching, organizing, and presenting information about a state-the scaffolds and performance criteria are individualized for each student.