A Research Reader in Universal Design for Learning

This fascinating and inventive book surveys the UDL research field in comprehensive detail while pointing—in imaginative and necessary ways—to crucial research undertakings yet to come.

In recent years there has been heightened interest in Universal Design for Learning (UDL), particularly within the worlds of education policy and practice. As a framework that reduces barriers and maximizes learning opportunities for all students, UDL provides a powerful and comprehensive answer to the growing call for more “personalized” curricular materials that can accommodate the full diversity of learners and teachers within the education system.

This book considers the major research areas that underlie UDL and call out for further exploration in the years ahead. Each of the book’s six chapters includes a groundbreaking article that is centrally related to the larger UDL project, along with reflections on that article by contemporary researchers. As David H. Rose notes in his afterword, “the authors of this collection have set out to do more than revitalize and illuminate the foundations of UDL. They have set out also to prepare the field—to set the context—for the kind of research that needs to come now.”

Gabrielle Rappolt-Schlichtmann is director of research at CAST, where she oversees all research activities, supporting her colleagues to work as a team and providing guidance in the areas of research methodology and data analysis. She also coordinates with senior leadership to strategically advance CAST’s mission and vision.

Rappolt-Schlichtmann’s research is focused on the affective components of UDL. Her area of expertise is in the relationship between emotion and cognition during learning, especially with regard to the impact of children’s experiences of stress on emotion and cognitive performance in the context of school. At CAST, she has led multiple research and development projects funded by organizations such as the National Science Foundation, the Institute of Education Sciences, EduCause, and the National Institutes of Health. Her work has been published in many refereed journals, including Experimental Brain Research, Mind, Brain and Education, Early Childhood Research Quarterly, Development and Psychopathology, Behavioral Neuroscience, and Applied Neuropsychology.

Through her work, Rappolt-Schlichtmann works to make explicit connections between research and practice, developing education technology based in UDL that leverages her research in the areas of developmental neuroscience, emotion, motivation, contextual support, and scaffolding. She is currently serving a three-year term as a member of the National Center for Learning Disabilities Professional Advisory Board and is an adjunct lecturer at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, where she teaches the course Emotion in Development and Learning: Usable Knowledge, Variability and Context.

Samantha G. Daley is a research scientist at CAST, where she investigates the relationship between emotions and cognitive performance of students, particularly those with learning disabilities. She focuses on the role of emotions in learning activities and how to design instruction to reflect the relationship between emotion and cognition in learning. In addition to this work, she has contributed to projects funded by the U.S. Department of Education’s Institute for Educational Sciences and the National Science Foundation to incorporate UDL in middle school and high school science curricula and has led efforts at supporting implementation of the principles of UDL in lesson development and schoolwide change.

Before joining CAST, Daley was a clinical fellow in the Learning Disabilities Program at Children’s Hospital, Boston, an instructor in the Language and Literacy Program at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, and a learning disabilities specialist working with high school and college students.

Daley holds a doctorate in human development and psychology from the Harvard Graduate School of Education. She has published her work in Mind, Brain and Education, for which she was co-editor of a special section, and the Journal of Postsecondary Education and Disability.

L. Todd Rose brings a background in cognitive neuroscience, dynamic systems, and developmental psychology to his work as a research scientist at CAST. He investigates the ways perception, attention, and working memory interact to shape learning and participates in the development of tools that support the recognition and strategic components of UDL.

Before joining CAST, Rose was a postdoctoral fellow with the Laboratory for Visual Learning (Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics), where his work included National Science Foundation–funded research on the link between dyslexia and visual abilities in astrophysics. His previous work includes research on the impact of fixational eye motions on visual learning, the influence of working memory on reading fluency, and the application of dynamic systems concepts to theories of development. He has also served on U.S. and international panels evaluating the promise and future of neuroscience in education.

Rose currently serves on faculty at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, where he teaches a course on educational neuroscience and is co-chair of the summer institute for Mind, Brain, and Education. He lectures nationally and internationally on learning disabilities, the importance of working memory in K–12 classrooms, and the role of neuroscience in education.