This week, we had the privilege of having guest speakers from BCEdAccess, Kaori Lau and Tracy Humphreys, come to our class. The discussion for the day’s class was about technology and inclusion. This class was very interesting for me as someone who would like to one day complete a program for inclusive education. In the opening activity, depending on which colour of sticky note you got, you were told you had to leave the class or you were allowed to stay with no information on why. This activity had me thinking right away about why some people had to leave and why some were able to stay. The first thing that came to my mind was inclusivity and what the group being sent outside was going to learn.
As a future teacher, one goal that I strive for is being able to provide a safe and welcoming environment for all students, and this class helped me build toward that goal. One of the ways that I can provide a safe and welcoming environment in my class is through technology. This lecture discussed the different ways you can implement technology in your classroom to assist students, for example, by turning on closed captions. This is a simple, easy-to-learn way that you can support students when playing videos in class.
This class lecture made me connect back to learning about the universal design for learning framework. Many of the different ways a teacher can implement technology to assist students are seen in lessons that encompass the UDL framework. Moving forward, this lecture has helped me understand all the ways that technology can be of support to a student. I will continue to develop my own skills with technology so that I can better support my future students through technology.