Reflective Insight

As a kindergarten teacher for the past seven years, creating and presenting academic content that was inclusive and culturally responsive was an essential part of my daily instruction. However, my understanding of being culturally responsive was cursory. This course, especially with the empathy challenges, really allowed me to empathize with disabled persons. This truly made me aware of the challenges and limitations one might face and just how important creating an inclusive environment is for not only these students, but all students. 

My most profound insights from this course are as follows.

• Creating an inclusive learning environment should be a "proactive process." This means that accommodations need to be thought of during the creative process of the course design and not added after the course is developed. This type of proactive process makes for a more inclusive learning environment.
• There are laws and rules that regulate online learning courses and webpages to make them as inclusive as possible. (WCAG, ADA)
• It is important as a digital learning designer to assess the accessibility of the digital material. This can be done by using an evaluation, which includes built in tools (Microsoft accessibility checker) and/or check lists to assess the functionality and inclusiveness of the course.
• All content included on a digital learning platform must be accessible for all. This includes adding closed-captioning to videos, adding alternative text to images, and creating PDF documents that are in compliance with accessibility standards.
• It is important for a digital learning designer to have a basic understanding of the Universal Design for Learning when creating digital content. The UDL guidelines take into account "scientific insights" on how people learn. This knowledge can be extremely helpful to create content that is engaging, rigorous, and purposeful. 

Once I become a learning designer, it is imperative I am knowledgeable in the areas of inclusivity and accessibility. The knowledge I have gained in this course will allow me to create content that is accessible for all.