Planning for All Learners (PAL)

http://www.cast.org/teachingeverystudent/toolkits/tk_introduction.cfm?tk_id=21

Do you want to learn about UDL and the PAL concepts? Do you want to practice applying PAL with templates, tutorials and tools? Do you want to find UDL/PAL resources to use in the classroom or in a teacher workshop? Do you want to see how others have applied PAL in the classroom? Then you are in the right location.

PAL, Planning for All Learners, pertains to UDL and the planning and developing of curricula in ways that promote access, participation, and progress in the general education environment for all students. This website allows you to submerge yourself into this content and really be apart of the PAL and UDL community.

This site is broken into three components: Procedures, Examples, and Resources. In this first component, procedures, the site breaks down the process to enable every teacher, with the most to the least experience, to practice this process in their classroom. We begin with setting the goals, then analyze the current status, apply UDL to the lesson/unit, and finally teach the UDL lesson/unit. Through the outline provided this process is made much more approachable and obtainable at any teaching level. I have never formally used UDL in my lesson planning and after reading through this outline I found it to be easy and successful. In the following component, examples are different unit plans and case studies that use UDL in teaching practices. This piece to me was hit or miss. I feel this way because I teach elementary and early childhood education and did not find many examples that would benefit me directly however while looking through the examples provided could prove to be very helpful to any of those teaching in the middle and secondary classrooms. But by using the procedures and reading through the different examples, as a elementary education teacher, I could use the pieces to help me create my own lesson/unit. And in the resources section was very good. A couple dozen resources are provided to help teachers and educators better prepare themselves for using PAL and UDL in the classroom. This one website, while I found it to be very strong and helpful, may not answer all of your questions. So providing a list of other sources will help you complete the package. Sources are given for Universal Design for Learning, Curriculum and Teaching Practices, and Professional Development.

*Below is a diagram, found on the above webs tie, that demonstrates the procedural process used when creating lessons/unit plans.