The knowledge of UDL learnt this week is very surprising which is in line with the knowledge of constructivism learnt earlier and provides excellent system to enhance learning. UDL can provide a prominent role in the three areas of engagement, presentation, action and expression. This may sound hard to understand, but I found an example. In the video, the teacher provides a task objective and a task model of making a model as a special way of engaging students; group discussion and video presenting the information; and finally gaining knowledge based on practice.

Accessibility I think is most important to understand the basics of all students, for example blind students tend to have more need for braille and sound, and for many people computers are also challenging. I think it would be an appropriate strategy to know physical information about the students, such as computer access, before the course begins. But for me, free teaching resources would probably be the most appealing accessibility, after all, textbooks really aren’t cheap.

I think of sites like Chegg, a membership website that answer the homework questions, have some ethical challenges. On the one hand this raises questions of fairness and academic integrity, on the other hand learning using these platforms is very much on the side. For example, if I don’t know a certain type of topic, through Chegg I am able to see how other people answer the questions and it can inspire me to learn. I think it could be a solution if the method or idea of answering is actively shown and explained within the course.

I think Brightspace is a great platform to use, although there are some accessibility issues, such as a lot of the content in course tools that I don’t use very often, and many teachers don’t use it very much. However, UVic students and teachers do have the ability to achieve UDL and accessibility with this tool. Further, I would like to improve the UI part or the web design, the use is a bit strange compared to my past experiences with blackboard.