When Kim Babeu created her S.P.O.R.T. system, she was thinking about what skills learners needed to be successful in the world. For her, those included:
- sportsmanship (e.g., cooperating with others and upholding one another),
- participation (e.g., being fully present and involved on behalf of yourself and for the team)
- organization (e.g., includes being on time and prepared),
- respect (e.g., watching their language, respecting oneself and others), and
- teamwork (e.g., stepping up to the plate).
As described during the podcast, this system has led to wonderful outcomes for her students. She’s so excited about it, she sent me student interviews where they talked about the impact SPORT has had on them. They shared the following:
They see themselves as individuals who are part of a collective:
Marquel, sophomore: “You feel closer with your peers. We are so far ahead because we have quite a few kids that are just a lot more mature and on task. Their characters are just amazing. They are good people.”
Adrianna G. “I think we’ve earned so many 5 out of 5s because we work together. Like, if there’s a problem we’ll all help out. We all participate. We’re all on the team.”
Alexis, junior. “I think our class works as a team and actually wants to earn the sports and follows it. This class feels different. It feels like the class wants to be here and actually learn what we’re learning Other classes just come [sic to school] just because they have to.”
Marcos, Junior: “To earn a class wide like SPORT feels great because everybody was on task, doing their work, you know. Everything was just perfect, it was a perfect thing, you know? [And] this class feels like home because I feel, like it’s a structured place where I can be myself. I can see myself using it in the future because it helps keep me focused.”
Samira, sophomore: “SPORT has helped me not just in class but out of class. It helps me in other classes because I know how to respect, talk, help my team, my classmates, and how to participate. It’s a big thing to understand because it has a lot of meaning in a lot of places. Learning how to respect yourself, elderly, other students.”
More focused:
Diego, sophomore (via a student translator). “S.P.O.R.T. made him be more focused in class which made him more respectful and want to do better in class.”
Alexis, junior: “In my classes it has helps me stay more focused and calm. It has helped me be more respectful of teachers and be more on task. I’ll follow [sic S.P.O.R.T.] when I’m not in school because it has made me become a better person in life and accomplish more things. S.P.O.R.T. is a really good thing. It has helped me in many ways and I’m sure it will help you, too!”
Larry, sophomore: “[sic S.P.O.R.T.] has helped me motivate myself. It helps me stay focused in class.”
Understanding themselves as learners and citizens:
Marquel, sophomore. “I do better with set goals in mind. With SPORT, there’s a goal for the day, so I do better. It keeps me on task.”
Alexis, junior. “Has helped me in many ways, not only in school but in life. It has helped me become more responsible and organized and respect others more. It has helped me realize that everybody deserves respect.”
Marco, junior: “S.P.O.R.T. has helped me mature my mentality and gain skills like be on time, pay attention and focus. It has helped me be engaged more with the lessons.”
Larry, sophomore: “It has helped me with daily activities, like if my mom needs some help, I’ll do what she asks me to out of honor and respect.”
The impact they can have on others:
Samira, sophomore: Responding to earning SPORT points as a class. “We have achieved a big goal because we worked for it. We really, like, put a lot of effort into it. We want to be role models and show other classes what we can do.”
Samira, sophomore: What she wants the world to know. “To just respect and work together, not throw shade at other people. Instead of putting them down, hold them up. Make a difference in life.”
And now…intentionality
When listening to Kim and hearing the outcomes these students have experienced, it’s easy to identify how S.P.O.R.T. aligns with UDL. A quick scan of the guidelines under Engagement alone shows a strong alignment to the affective networks. Those students are learning that: their choices make a difference (recruiting interest), being part of collective has value (recruiting interest), they are part of a collective (sustaining effort and persistence), goals are important in both class and in life (sustaining effort and persistence), the expectations set by Kim are meaningful and doable (self-regulation and recruiting interest), as they improve on their own coping skills, they will be able to accomplish more academically and in life (self-regulation), and that they have ability to reflect and alter their behaviors based on that reflection is a life skill (self-regulation). It’s no wonder this system has the potential to be seen as the implementation of UDL!
Did I just say “potential”? Yes. Is that a slam? No.
The number one thing that must happen to implement UDL is the intentional use of the framework to design something. That means we are thinking about the systematic variability and potential barriers learners might experience before any design decisions are made. But what if people tell you that they “see UDL” in your teaching and you don’t do either one of these things? It means you have been practicing strategies and methods that are backed by quality research and now you get to bring more into your repertoire! Let’s use S.P.O.R.T. as an example.
Toward the end of the podcast, Kim shares that she provides direct instruction about S.P.O.R.T. at the beginning of the year. She also uses posters and student leaders to help new students learn about S.P.O.R.T. to ensure they feel welcome and know how to be part of the community from the beginning. I did not have time to ask, though, what other barriers she has considered. I didn’t get to ask what systematic variability she knows will be present and how can she plan for that up-front. For example, Spanish is the predominant first language in her building, but these students are in an English-speaking environment. Though she knows that students support one another in their language-rich school, she can use Microsoft’s translator (LINK) and then ask students to clean up the translation. Now, her Spanish-speaking students don’t have to wait for their peers to assist them in reading about S.P.O.R.T. That barrier is removed.
Next, UDL is built on the premise that barriers are in the environment, not in the learner, and that the goal determines the support needed. If a learner utilized a wheelchair and needed to get from one room to the next and there are two steps, the barrier is that there is no ramp not that the learner uses a wheelchair. Likewise, if a leaner is a non-reader and they need to comprehend the directions for an experiment, the barrier is that the learner in not provided with audible directions (i.e., given by another learner, teacher, or technology), not that the learner is a non-reader.
If a teacher learns about S.P.O.R.T. but believes that student behaviors purely originate from inside the learner versus seeing behavior as a learner’s reaction to the environment, S.P.O.R.T. cannot work. That’s because the teacher will always look to the students to behave versus scanning the environment for barriers (e.g., something that might trigger a behavior in a student, academic tasks that aren’t scaffolded causing the student to act out, or academic tasks that are too simple causing the student to be bored and frustrated).
This is where UDL helps. How? The intentional and successful implementation of the UDL framework depends on an understanding of variability – context directly impacts all behavior. More specifically, UDL guides us to design environments that help students learn coping skills, self-assessment, and executive functioning.
Finally, after we worked together in the summer of 2018, Kim became enthused about providing her students choice during their anatomy assessments which we talked about in the first podcast. Now, she can ask herself whether her students have choice when learning about and demonstrating their understanding of S.P.O.R.T. When students aren’t successful in exemplifying S.P.O.R.T., are there barriers in the environment related to choice-making that can be removed? Can the process be scaffolded more for some students who demonstrate a lack of connection? These are the questions UDL makes us ask. This is the reflective use of the framework. This is how you guide your learners toward becoming expert learners.