providing access to engagement in learning: the potential of universal design for learning in museum...

ARTICLE

Providing Access to Engagement in Learning: The Potential ofUniversal Design for Learning in Museum DesignGABRIELLE RAPPOLT-SCHLICHTMANN AND SAMANTHA G. DALEY

Abstract Following passage of the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 (ADA), many museums

improved the accessibility of their facilities. Even so, individuals with disabilities still lag behind in

participation and engagement in museum experiences. Universal Design for Learning (UDL) provides an

alternate model for the design of museum programs and exhibit spaces, one that is more aligned to

progressive concepts of disability, providing not only physical access but also access to engagement in

learning. In this article we argue that UDL has the potential to substantially improve the design of informal

learning environments. Through two illustrative examples, we describe how the UDL design guidelines can

be used to improve the probability that engagement will occur as individuals interact with exhibits,

programs, and people inmuseums.

The development of long-term, deep inter-

est in topics of personal relevance is critically

important to the success of people with disabili-

ties in learning and in life, andmuseums have an

important role to play in sparking and cultivat-

ing such interests. Following passage of the

Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990

(ADA), many museums moved to improve the

accessibility of their facilities with the goal of

significantly expanding the reach of their pro-

gramming and exhibit spaces to people with dis-

abilities. The addition of wheelchair ramps,

lowered counters, captioned videos, and alter-

native descriptions for images, as well as audio

descriptions of exhibit offerings like the hand-

held audio guide system developed and imple-

mented by the New York Hall of Science in

2000 (Friedman 2000), are illustrative examples

of the kinds of accommodations that are now

provided.While the addition of such accommo-

dations has had a substantial and positive

impact on the ability of individuals with disabil-

ities to access museums, participation in learn-

ing and engagement still lag behind.

Accessibility solutions provide for the

improved physical presence of people with dis-

abilities in museum spaces (for example, a text

label, when converted to audio or braille for the

blind, allows access for people with low vision).

But accessibility does not, on its own, allow for

the engagement of people with disabilities in the

museum experience per se (for example, engag-

ing with and learning from audio or text labels).

Universal Design for Learning (UDL) provides

an alternate model for the design of museum

programs and exhibit spaces that is more aligned

to progressive concepts of disability (Meyer,

Rose, and Gordon, in press). Under UDL, dis-

ability is understood as an artifact of limitations

of the designed environment. Disability is not

situated within the person, but rather in the

interaction between the person and the environ-

ment. Difficulty is experienced as a result of

design that did not anticipate the full range of

Gabrielle Rappolt-Schlichtmann ([email protected]), Harvard Graduate School of Education and CAST, Inc.

Samantha G. Daley ([email protected]), CAST, Inc.; 40 Harvard Mills Square, Suite 3, Wakefield, Massachusetts

01880-3233.

307

Volume 56 Number 3 July 2013

variability in the population. The UDL guide-

lines provide a translational framework between

the learning sciences and education design.

When thoughtfully applied, these guidelines

improve accessibility, and access to engagement

in learning is muchmore likely to be achieved.

In this article, we posit that accessibility is a

necessary but not sufficient solution to the inclu-

sion of people with disabilities in museum expe-

riences. We explain how UDL, as a framework

for design, reflects more progressive and con-

temporary views of disability, and we describe

how the UDL guidelines can be used in design

to substantially improve the probability that

engagement will occur for individuals as they

interact with exhibits, programs, and people in

museum spaces. We argue that UDL has the

potential to substantially improve the design of

informal learning environments, and that, in this

regard, museums have a special role to play in

supporting people with disabilities to reach their

potential and flourish throughout their lives.

A PROGRESSIVE, INCLUSIVE CONCEPT

OF DISABILITY

With the best of intentions, theorists,

researchers, and developers working in disabil-

ity-focused fields have tended to focus on tech-

nical solutions to the disability “problem”

(Swadener and Lubek 1995; Dudley-Marling

2004; Albrecht, Seelman, and Bury 2001).

What is the best method by which to present

information to a person who is blind, deaf or

cognitively impaired? What are the causes of

learning disability?What is the best approach to

identifying people with disabilities so as to pro-

vide them with appropriate accommodations?

The focus on the person as “problem” has led to

solutions that emphasize fixes and the selection

of best methods to remediate or accommodate

the problem in the designed environment. This

technical, deficit orientation to the “problem” of

disability rests on the assumption that disability

is a kind of pathology that lies within the per-

son, and as such there is nothing wrong with the

environment per se.

In response to the deficit model, scholars

and disability advocates have advanced an alter-

nate paradigm called the social constructivist

model of disability. This approach focuses on

the “dynamic interplay of the person and envi-

ronment rather than the individual or environ-

ment alone” (Thaper et al. 2004, 280; Albrecht,

Seelman, and Bury 2001). The appropriate

question is no longer What’s wrong with Billy?

or even What’s wrong with this designed envi-

ronment? but, rather, What’s going on between

Billy and the designed environment that is cre-

ating the problem? This shift represents a pro-

found change in thinking; it proposes that the

disability “problem” is a function of social barri-

ers played out through the interactions between

individuals and environments (Oliver 1990).

Importantly, the social constructivist model of

disability has been advanced in public policy,

including the Americans with Disabilities Act

of 1990 (ADA), the Olmstead Act (1999), and

the World Health Organization’s International

Classification of Disability (World Health

Organization 2001).

DESIGNED ENVIRONMENTS AND THE

CONCEPT OF DISABILITY

All institutions, including museums, are

human creations. They are designed to fulfill

specific social needs and tend to reflect the

values of the culture where they are situated

(Berger and Luckman 1966). Importantly,

models of museum visitor experiences place a

heavy emphasis on the dynamic interplay

between the visitor (or group of visitors) and the

designed museum space, recognizing that it is

308 Article: UDL and Museum Design

CURATOR THE MUSEUM JOURNAL

the interaction between the two that shapes the

museum experience (Falk and Dierking 2013;

Pekarik, Doering, and Karns 1999). However,

this emphasis on variability of experiences, with

visitors creating a diverse set of narratives based

on their individual contexts, is rarelymaintained

when shifting to the consideration of visitors

with disabilities.

In large part, contemporary attempts to

include individuals with disabilities in museum

experiences have continued to focus on accom-

modation, or “fixes” to the physical design,

which are intended to address limitations in

individual visitors’ abilities rather than reformu-

lating design practices, because the deficit

model of disability persists within American

culture (French and Swain 2001; Goodley

2001). The view of the disabled person as “prob-

lem” is perpetuated in the media and popular

culture, creating misconceptions of the experi-

ence of disability and conditions for the stigma-

tization of people with disabilities (Donoghue

2003). Likewise, an accommodation view of

design reinforces the idea that there is a “nor-

mal” way of experiencing themuseum.

Interestingly, in the United States over the

last decade, we have witnessed a conceptual shift

within formal public education away from

accommodation, toward greater interest in pro-

viding “personalized” curricular materials. This

shift in cultural values within the education sys-

tem may reflect a rapidly changing social need:

There is a greater diversity of learners and

teachers within the education system than ever

before. In this context, Universal Design for

Learning is gaining traction within public edu-

cation because it offers a means to provide

opportunities for deep learning through the

design of highly flexible methods, materials,

and assessments (Meyer, Rose, and Gordon in

press; Rose and Meyer 2002; Rose, Meyer, and

Hitchcock 2005). This sort of design solution

is part of the new call for “personalized”

materials.

Models for museum design already call for

a dynamic view of the person in context

(Falk and Dierking 2013), but this focus on

interaction and variability needs to be general-

ized to account for the presence of people with

disability in museum spaces. Focusing exclu-

sively on physical access does not reflect the full

spirit of a dynamic view of museum experiences.

Through Universal Design for Learning, the

focus of museum design can be recast from

“accommodation” to design that provides access

to engagement in learning, where emphasis is

placed on the provision of flexibility in the envi-

ronment from the beginning.

Importantly, reaching fully accessible solu-

tions to museum design is more than a disability

issue. The research literature clearly indicates

that when exhibits and programs provide for

access and learning for individuals with disabili-

ties, the benefits for all museum visitors are

palpable (Meyer, Rose, and Gordon in press).

As noted in the Smithsonian Guidelines for

Accessible Exhibition Design: “Discovering

exciting, attractive ways to make exhibitions

accessible will most directly serve people with

disabilities and older adults. But to name an

audience who will not benefit by these designs is

impossible. Accessibility begins as a mandate to

serve people who have been discriminated

against for centuries; it prevails as a tool that

serves diverse audiences for a lifetime” (http://

www.si.edu/Accessibility/SGAED).

WHAT IS UNIVERSAL DESIGN FOR

LEARNING?

First conceived in the early 1990s, UDL is

in many ways a direct response to the “child as

problem” approach to disability in theAmerican

public school system. UDL is inspired by the

Gabrielle Rappolt-Schlichtmann and Samantha G. Daley 309


universal design concept in architecture, devel-

oped by Ron Mace of North Carolina State

University. The focus of UDL is on the design,

creation, and study of learning environments

that are usable by and effective for as many peo-

ple as possible. The classic example of universal

design borrowed from architecture is the curb

cut. The design of the curb cut was rendered as

flexibly as possible from the beginning, so as to

be usable by the widest range of people without

requiring changes or accommodations for spe-

cific “types” of people after the fact. There is no

need for people in wheelchairs to accommodate

to the environment. The design of the curb cut

is flexible enough to accept whoever—skate-

boarders, people with strollers, and so on—any-

one who wants to move from the street to the

sidewalk (see photo 1). Museums have increas-

ingly adopted a universal design approach to

physical features, by building ramps and wid-

ened entries to exhibit spaces (Tokar 2004;

NISE Network 2010). UDL enlists the ideas of

the universal design movement within architec-

ture and expands them to deal explicitly with

access to engagement in learning.

The creation of the UDL framework was

the result of a careful synthesis of relevant

research from across the learning sciences: a

concrete representation of our best and current

understanding of the variables most salient in

the process of learning (Rose and Gravel 2012).

Three principles underlie the framework of

UDL: design should provide for 1) multiple

means of representation, 2) multiple means of

expression and action, and 3) multiple means of

engagement (Rose andMeyer 2002).1

These principles reflect a recurring theme

within the learning sciences, which describe

three broad divisions in the processes associ-

ated with learning (see Vygotsky 1978;

Bloom 1984). Even the modern neuroscienc-

es reflect this tripartite view of the learning

brain with pattern recognition in posterior

regions of the cortex, executive function in

frontal cortex, and affective processing cen-

tered in the medial regions of the nervous

system (Rappolt-Schlichtmann, Daley, and

Rose 2012; Luria 1973).

The concept of disability under UDL is a

further example of how the framework explicitly

derives from the learning sciences. The most

consistent finding to emerge from the modern

science of learning is that variability in learning

is the rule, not the exception. No matter what

aspect of learning is studied, no matter how pre-

cise the instruments or measures, and no matter

what level of analysis, the reality is that variabil-

ity permeates throughout (see Fischer and Bidell

2006; Plomin and Kovas 2005; Thelen and

Smith 1994; van Geert 1998). Disability repre-

sents a type of variability within the population

that is not typically attended to within designed

learning environments. When learning environ-

Photo 1. The universal benefits of curb cuts. Photo by

CAST, Inc., courtesy of the Museum of Science, Boston.



ments are designed only to meet the needs of an

average person or the middle 50th percentile of

people, they do not address the reality of vari-

ability within the population, and equal oppor-

tunities for engagement are not provided. The

UDL framework advances the design of learning

environments by providing flexibility in goals,

methods, and materials. Variability is assumed

so that learning environments are designed from

the outset to meet the needs of as many learners

as possible, making costly, time-consuming, and

after-the-fact changes unnecessary.

LEARNING FROM THE MARGINS

Under UDL, customizable options are

essential to addressing the variability of learners

so that individuals are able to experience the

environment and its opportunities for learning

from where they are and not where we imagine

them to be. But how can we anticipate the

necessary flexibility and design for it? Resources

are limited and design is not limitless. From a

UDL perspective, people with disabilities have

a unique role to play in design because they are

particularly vulnerable to inflexible, “one-size-

fits-all” solutions; they represent the edge of

variability within the population. When people

with disabilities have difficulty in a designed

environment, it is often a sign that others with-

out disabilities are also having difficulty, though

it may not be readily apparent. By attending to

the challenges faced by individuals in the design

process, learning environments can be made

more accessible and engaging to a wider array of

museum visitors.When design focuses on creat-

ing accommodations to the “problem” of dis-

ability after the fact, difficulties experienced by

other individuals without disabilities may

remain invisible.

Consider an analogy from medicine that

may make this idea more tractable. Let’s say

there are two approaches to the treatment of

coal miner’s disease. One approach identifies

the source of the disease as a medical health

problem—a disease of the lungs—that requires

immediate medical treatment for the individ-

ual. The second approach identifies the source

of the disease as an environmental health

problem—a disease caused by traumatizing

carcinogens in the mines, invisible and odor-

less gases—that requires systemic changes in

the environment. Both approaches are essen-

tial, but what we highlight here is that under

UDL people with disabilities are like “canaries

in the mine.”

Canaries were used as an early warning sys-

tem for coal miners; they were sensitive to issues

in the environment when those issues were

imperceptible to human beings. Because people

with disabilities represent the edge of variability

in the population along many dimensions in

learning, the difficulties they experience are an

early warning that the design of the environment

has been left wanting. In fact, we would say that

the need for accommodation to provide accessi-

bility after the fact indicates that the design of

the environment is lacking in some systematic

way that may be affecting many more people’s

experiences than just those with disabilities.

Let’s take an example from exhibit design

to make these ideas more concrete. By defini-

tion, dyslexia is a language-based processing

disability that affects learning. People with dys-

lexia have difficulty with reading, writing, spell-

ing, and even the processing and understanding

of spoken language. From a UDL perspective,

people with dyslexia need only be “disabled” if

placed in an environment where their brand of

variability in learning is not accounted for in

design. Exhibit labels are meant to provide

effective communication between museums and

visitors, but they are “disabling” to people with

dyslexic-like characteristics. If text is the only



way “in,” then no matter what a designer does

with the space, layout, lighting, materials, ideas,

and messages associated with the label, people

who are dyslexic aren’t going to get anything

“out.” Worse, people with learning disabilities

like dyslexia are hard to spot; they are invisible

and not likely to identify themselves or demand

accommodations.

Interestingly, and to our point, it turns out

that lots of people have difficulty with labels—

the elderly, children who are not reading profi-

cient, and even visitors who are expert readers,

but who hold goals that are not aligned to read-

ing the text labels associated with exhibits. That

few visitors spend time reading labels is a com-

mon concern of museum designers (Falk 1982),

but, in fact, in some ways it seems an adaptive

choice not to read the labels. Falk and Dierking

(2013) suggest that reading all of the labels in

even a medium-sized museum would take at

least several days (citing Wolf and Tymitz

1978). That’s not to say that text based labels are

“bad” design. They are efficient and useful to

many people, but without other flexible options

built into the design of the exhibit, which allow

for a more customizable experience, many visi-

tors will miss out on the essential information

contained in the label, and, worse, they will miss

out on being in conversation with the museum

as they experience the exhibit. Considering the

needs of visitors with dyslexia—those who are

at the margins of variability in one aspect of

learning, gaining meaning from text, and who

would otherwise be invisible to designers—

broadens the consideration of learner needs to

enable more effective design for all.

UDL AS A FRAMEWORK FOR MUSEUM

DESIGN

There is a substantial and growing body of

work that identifies effective practices to accom-

modate disability in museum design (Smithso-

nian Guidelines for Accessible Exhibition

Design; Universal Design Guidelines for Public

Programs in Science Museums from the NISE

Network). We believe this work provides an

effective foundation on which UDL can begin

to be leveraged in the museum context. Impor-

tantly, most museum design is already aligned

to the spirit of UDL. Museum visitors’ back-

grounds, expectations, and approaches to learn-

ing are considered in design processes. There is

less starting adherence to fixed, and largely inac-

cessible, technologies like text or lecture than

there are in other institutions (like schools);

these starting conditions make alignment to

UDLnot only desirable, but particularly feasible.

To facilitate the active design of UDL envi-

ronments and their implementation, CAST

(Center for Applied Special Technology, www.

cast.org) created guidelines grounded in the

three principles. These guidelines articulate the

UDL framework and provide a starting set of

considerations for design (CAST 2008, 2011).

Principle I deals with the “what” of learning:

representation. There are systematic differences

in the ways that individuals perceive and com-

prehend information from the world around

them. For example, people with sensory diffi-

culties, dyslexia, or cultural differences will

require different ways of perceiving the environ-

ment and it’s essential to provide multiple

means of representation, or options in the ways

in which information is presented.

Principle II deals with the “how” of learn-

ing: expression. There are systematic differences

in the ways that individuals navigate the

environment and express what they know. For

example, people with movement impairment,

those with strategic and organizational

difficulty, or language barriers, will require dif-

ferent ways of acting in the environment and

expressing what they know. Multiple means of



expression and action, or options in the ways

people are supported to be strategic within the

environment, are essential. Finally, Principal III

deals with the “why” of learning: engagement.

There are systematic differences in the ways in

which people orient to the environment emo-

tionally, are motivated, and engaged in learning

processes. Variation in background knowledge,

personal relevance, and culture all contribute

to the ways in which individuals affectively

appraise and act in the environment. There is no

single way to engage all people through design;

providing options for engagement is crucial.

A dive into the details of the UDL guide-

lines is beyond the scope of this paper, but it is

important to note that there are nine guidelines

and associated checkpoints that instantiate the

three principles described above (CAST 2008,

2011; for full articulation see www.udlcenter.

org/aboutudl/udlguidelines). To provide more

clarity around how UDL might be used to

enhance the design of museum programs and

exhibits, we explore designing for engagement

and two promising case examples below.

DESIGNING FOR ENGAGEMENT IN

MUSEUM SETTINGS: A UDL

PERSPECTIVE AND CASE EXAMPLE

While design in museum settings has long

paid rich attention to engaging visitors in learn-

ing experiences (Falk and Dierking 2013;

Kirchberg and Trondle 2012;McLean and Pol-

lock 2011), considering “engagement” in light

of the deeply co-regulated nature of emotion

and cognition represents a next phase of engag-

ing all visitors. Few would question that emo-

tion and thought are deeply, critically

intertwined, and that the relationship between

them affects learning. Reasoning, decision-

making, and even fundamental skills like read-

ing and mathematics, do not function as purely

rational, cognitive systems. The accuracy and

efficiency of thinking processes, perceptions,

and effort are influenced by affective states;

motivation and emotion substantially predict

learning behavior and outcomes (Ellis, Thomas,

and Rodriguez 1984; Ellis, Thomas, and Rodri-

guez 1984; Elliot and Dweck 2005; Pajares and

Miller 1994).

Under the UDL framework, within educa-

tion—in formal or informal settings—

“engagement” is the critical construct that

describes the essential relationship between

emotion and cognition in the context of learn-

ing. When considered from the affective and

cognitive neurosciences, engagement—a men-

tal state needed for successful learning—can be

achieved through the application of appropriate

challenges that are precisely calibrated to indi-

vidual learners’ specific strengths and weak-

nesses (Blascovich et al. 2003; Csiksentmihalyi

1991; Daley and Rappolt-Schlichtmann 2009;

Lazarus and Folkman 1984). Current research

points not to a continual ratcheting up of acti-

vation or even positive emotion to promote

learning, but instead to a focus on tuning arou-

sal and emotion to the specific conditions of the

learning task and the learner. Without support

for sustained effort, persistence, and emotion

regulation, participant arousal—even when

overwhelmingly positive—can lead to disen-

gagement and cursory attentiveness rather than

deep experiences of learning (Blascovich, Men-

des, Tomaka, Salomon, and Seery 2003;

Csiksentmihalyi 1991; Daley and Rappolt-Sch-

lichtmann 2009; Lazarus and Folkman 1984).

This is especially challenging in the science

museum environment when considering the

diversity of learners’ background knowledge,

learning strengths and weaknesses, and goals.

Several theories describing the relationship

between emotion and cognition converge on

the importance of the balance between the level



of challenge in the environment and one’s

perceived skills and resources as the driving

force in shaping affective responses and

cognitive engagement (Blascovich et al. 2003;

Csikszentmihalyi 1991; Lazarus and Folkman

1984; Daley and Rappolt-Schlichtmann 2009).

The research literature suggests that the deepest

engagement and, consequently, the most posi-

tive conditions for learning, occur when: 1) both

the challenge of the task and one’s own

resources (or skill level) are high and are closely

matched, 2) the task and/or content appear rele-

vant to the learner, and 3) the learning environ-

ment is under the learner’s control. Learning

environments often fail to tap into the potential

for deep engagement in learning by leaving

emotion largely unchecked. In many museum

settings, this triggers the “pinball” effect, with

visitors bouncing from one exhibit to another,

as highly attractive activities vie for attention

(Falk and Dierking 2013, 108). As designers

move to address this concern, calibrating

demands and resources using the UDL frame-

work in design provides a useful lens. UDL

frames what dimensions of learner variability

should be attended to and leveraged in design so

that visitors have a sort of customized experi-

ence, emerging from options built into the

design of the exhibit or program. The result is

that the visitor has a “just-right for me,” “just in

time” experience as they are able to easily adjust

how they relate to the exhibit or program. The

visitor perceives demands and resources to be in

balance as they experience themuseum.

As an example, we return to our consider-

ation of visitors with dyslexic type characteris-

tics.2 In taking a UDL approach to labels in

exhibit design, designers would work to consider

such visitors’ perceptions of the demands and

resources of an exhibit in terms of representation,

action or expression, and engagement. The goal

is to provide integrated options through design

that allow visitors to manipulate the environ-

ment so that the exhibit or program is experi-

enced as effective and personalized. No

“particular” way of experiencing the exhibit is

emphasized or obviously preferred in the design.

For the sake of parsimony, in this example

we will focus here on consideration of the repre-

sentation principle. For visitors who have

difficulty learning from text, we would expect

that the demands of information being

presented primarily in the form of text-based

labels would be substantial. If UDL were the

design approach, resources would need to be

provided to counterbalance such demands. Such

resources might include easy access to audio ver-

sions of the text labels, or supporting images

and graphics that provide an alternative repre-

sentation. Less obvious, informational “tags” in

text and alternate forms would be provided that

expressly relate the content of the label to the

content of the exhibit. Ideally these “tags” would

be proximal to the most relevant aspects of the

content of the exhibit. Remember that people

with dyslexia have difficulty with text because

they have difficulty processing information.

Relating information in the label to what is

going on in the exhibit is a significant demand

within the design.

Though not comprehensive, the resource

options described in this example would allow

visitors with dyslexic characteristics to have con-

trol over their experience of the exhibit. Impor-

tantly, a UDL approach would render the

various ways of accessing an exhibit or program

salient, equally valued, and equally effective.

People who are blind or have difficulty with text

would not feel that audio is expressly provided

for them because of their disability, but rather

that audio is an essential and integrated part of

the exhibit design. Under UDL scaffolding,

understanding of the various ways to gain

information (through representation) will sup-



port visitors to choose appropriately from the

options; they can perform their own calibration

because they have the necessary tools in the

design. This alleviates the designer’s need to

determine an approach that works for all; the

designer is not controlling the visitor’s experi-

ence, but is creating conditions ripe for engage-

ment in learning.

PROMISING PROJECTS: THE BEGINNING

OF UDL IN MUSEUM DESIGN

In looking to the museum design field,

some promising projects demonstrate the con-

cepts that ground UDL. These design projects

generally provided for a more adaptive learning

environment within museums and are rich with

resources (Chu, Hwang, Tsai, and Chen 2009;

Huang, Huang, and Chen 2007; Tsai 2009;

Wang 2009). In the following sections we

describe two existing, illustrative examples that

we feel provide an excellent foundation to

anchor burgeoning research and development at

the intersection of UDL andmuseum design.

Electronic Guidebook Project, the

Exploratorium

Though not explicitly “doing” UDL, the

Electronic Guidebook Project, developed at the

Exploratorium in San Francisco, went beyond

accommodation of disability toward a UDL

approach by providing nomadic resources to visi-

tors using a wireless handheld mobile device

(Hsi 2003). Using the Electronic Guidebook

(http://www.exploratorium.edu/guidebook) vis-

itors could explore ideas and plan their visits

before arriving at the Exploratorium and then

interact with exhibits by experiencing phenom-

ena and testing ideas in a personalized way. The

goal was to create a more seamless experience of

the museum. Visitors are supported to have

a more sustained experience than the typical

30-second interaction with exhibit content

(Cone and Kendall 1978; Beer 1987). The

Electronic Guidebook was developed as a suite

of resources to enhance all visitors’ experience of

existing Exploratorium exhibits and was not

intended for any particular type of visitor. The

content of the Guidebook provided substantial

resources and options to facilitate personalized

interaction with exhibits, including: background

information on the history and evolution of the

exhibit; “Try This” activities; visitor-contributed

responses, including observations and theories;

digital videos with models of how one might

interact with the exhibit; text and audio

explanations; and links showing other related

exhibits.

Interestingly, visitors relayed many positive

experiences of the guidebook, but some also

reported feeling isolated and experienced diffi-

culty moving between the real and virtual

worlds. From aUDLperspective, these accounts

are likely due to the fact that the Guidebook,

though intended for all visitors, still acted as an

accommodation to or layer on top of existing

exhibits. Visitors were, in a sense, having the dis-

ability experience. They were provided with a

tool meant to create better access to and enhance

their experience of the museum, but the tool was

not integrated into the design of the exhibit

itself. It is not surprising that one of the results

was a sense of separateness and difficulty con-

necting to the “actual,” most highly valued object

in the environment, the exhibit itself. When

UDL guides design the “supports,” resources are

a principal and highly valued part of the content

and pedagogy in the design of the learning envi-

ronment. Mobile devices may be a part of the

technical solution because they allow for con-

text-aware personalization (Chen and Huang

2012; Hwang et al. 2009; Ogata and Yano

2004), but theywould optimally be an integrated



part of the design of the content and pedagogy

withinmuseum exhibits and programs. It cannot

be the case that all of the personalization,

resources, and support are located outside of and

separate from the designed exhibit.

Fish Farming, the Museum of Science,

Boston

Over the last 25 years, the Museum of Sci-

ence (MOS) in Boston has been generating and

disseminating knowledge about the creation of

educational experiences designed to engage all

museum visitors (Reich 2000). Themuseum is a

leader in defining what it means to design an

inclusive museum experience, and has recently

leveraged UDL in the design of exhibits embed-

ded with digital interactives. (See Reich 2005

for a full description of this work, including

multiple examples and associated research).

One example is called Fish Farming, an exhibit

situated within the Making Models exhibition,

where visitors can work with and create several

different kinds of models.

Fish Farming is designed as a stand-alone

kiosk where visitors use a computer simulation

to solve a fish farming dilemma, namely:

“What’s the best way to stop a disease from

spreading in your tank?” (Reich 2005). Visitors

can adjust the number of fish in the tank and the

percent of fish vaccinated, and then run simula-

tions in a life-like scenario.

The design of “Fish Farming” expressly

reflects many of the UDL guidelines. First and

foremost, the interactive is rendered so as to be

accessible to visitors with a range of physical and

sensory needs. There is embedded audio, which

visitors can control (UDL guideline, check-

points 1.2 and 1.3). The labels are as simple as

possible, while still conveying the goal of the

experience and essential directions (see

photo 2). The title label reads “Fish Farming:

Can You Stop theDisease?” and “Fish Farming:

Using Models to Find Solutions… Press the

Round Enter Button to Begin” (UDL guide-

line, checkpoint 6.1). As the experience begins,

visitors are presented with a brief 40-word over-

view of the activity. The text, while helpful, is

not essential for visitors to access or have success

with the interactive, since understanding is pro-

moted through the use of multiple media (UDL

guideline, checkpoint 2.5).

Though not a comprehensive treatment,

this design is explicitly built on accessibility to

provide access to learning through application

of the UDL design guidelines. For example, vis-

itors are presented with two challenges they

might try, but they can also freely explore the

interactive. In this way, visitors have a meaning-

ful but limited set of choices that is meant to

support feelings of autonomy, interest, and the

generation of intrinsically motivated behavior

(UDL guideline, checkpoint 7.1). On the simu-

lation screen, visitors can see (or listen to audio

describing) a virtual tank containing up to one

thousand fish. Guiding instructions and feed-

back are provided in text and audio, since the

simulation visually changes depending on the

actions of the visitor. Feedback is also presented

in a small chart, where results of the visitor’s

most recent five simulations are tracked, and the

number of fish in the tank is indicated in real

time. Feedback is intended to highlight patterns

and critical features, so as to guide visitors’ pro-

cessing of the most important information

(UDL guideline, checkpoint 3.2)

In addition, the interactive provides

options for sustaining effort and persistence by

heightening the salience of goals and objectives

(UDL guideline, checkpoint 8.1), and provides

options for executive functions by enhancing

visitors’ capacity to monitor their progress

toward those goals (UDL guideline, checkpoint

6.4). Feedback is salient to the targeted goal,



simple to understand, and provided through at

least three simultaneous representations.

Importantly, accessibility related features inter-

act with and support the UDL related features,

so that those with disabilities not only have

access to the content of the exhibit, but also

interactive supports essential to the learning

design. For example, visitors can aurally track

changes to the number of fish in the tank, via a

tone that decreases or increases in pitch as the

number of fish in the tank changes in response

to visitor actions. This approach should support

not only those who are blind, but also children

who do not yet possess a strong number sense in

relating numbers to quantity.

There are many ways in which the design of

this exhibit could be further enhanced through

continued consideration of the UDL frame-

work. For example, an evaluation of the exhibit

notes that only 11 of the 55 groups of visitors

observed using the interactive successfully com-

pleted both challenges (Robertson 2003). Fur-

ther research would be required to understand

why visitors were unable or chose not to com-

plete the challenges, but the application of just-

in-time supports rendered through the design

of the digital interactive could better guide

visitors and encourage reflection and metacog-

nition (UDL guideline, checkpoint 8.2). Like-

wise, because visitors are so varied in their

background knowledge, computer facility, and

information processing, it’s advisable to create a

larger set of graduated challenges that vary in

the level of difficulty and systematically build

toward the targeted interactive experience

(UDL guideline, checkpoint 5.3; UDL guide-

line, checkpoint 3.1). Ideally all of these options

for challenge and support are customizable, so

Photo 2. The Fish Farming interactive. Photo by CAST, Inc., courtesy of the Museum of Science, Boston.


that visitors can quickly make choices about

how they want or need to experience the exhibit,

and thus have an opportunity for engagement

and learning from where they are and not where

we imagine them to be.

CONCLUSIONS

Recent progress in making museums acces-

sible learning environments for all visitors has

opened many doors. But to achieve universal

design for learning rather than simply universal

design for access requires even more from the

field. Significant research and development

work is needed to realize this shift, because the

development of UDL has been so firmly situ-

ated within formal learning contexts and, as

such, the guidelines strongly reflect the

demands of designing for formal learning sce-

narios. We propose a two-pronged agenda to

facilitate the active translation of UDL for use

in the design of informal learning contexts.

First, “on the ground” innovation through

successive iteration and trial-and-error in the

design of exhibits must occur. Successful “on

the ground” innovation and application of the

UDL framework will rely on clear articulation

of the learning goal toward which design deci-

sions are made.While others (Reich 2005) have

emphasized the importance of making explicit

the purpose or intended end-state of a given

activity, this is not typically equivalent to the

learning goal. Is the goal to demonstrate under-

standing of a particular science concept? Is it to

have a positive, interactive experience with fam-

ily members? Is it to connect with others in the

community in a new way? Is it to spark an inter-

est that might later develop into a passionate

hobby, academic pursuit, or career path?

Whereas in more formal learning settings, the

instructor has the prerogative to set learning

goals, articulate them in a way that is clear to

learners, and design for them, the informal

learning context presents a very different land-

scape in this regard.

Assuming a common goal for all visitors

would be inappropriate, but identifying a range

of goals that can be explicitly reflected in the

design of exhibits is essential if UDL is to be

successfully adapted and applied. It may be that

a more innovative approach to the development

of learning goals is needed. Perhaps, for exam-

ple, designers can support visitors to consider

their own goals; design will enable purposeful,

flexible means of pursuing activities in a way

that matches those goals. If a visitor group’s pri-

mary goal for the day is to have a positive family

experience, they might be provided with certain

strategies for interacting with exhibits that are

universally designed for that goal. But, if the

goal is to deeply understand the concept behind

a given exhibit, that might require a different

mode of interacting, perhaps with a way to

gauge background knowledge and provide sup-

port that is adjustable based on that knowledge,

and maybe including suggestions for reinforce-

ment activities that can be pursued at home.

This would be one approach to handling the

diversity of learning goals. Whatever approach

is taken, knowing what learning goals to design

for, and supporting visitors to understand the

intended learning goals, will be critical to think-

ing about how to create appropriate options and

supports towards those goals.

Second, innovative approaches should be

combined with design-based research to more

fully articulate the application of UDL in the

informal learning environment. The long-term

potential of UDL to transform designed learn-

ing environments—and what differentiates it

from other efforts to reform design—lies in the

unique opportunity for effectively facilitating

the connection between research in the learning

sciences and the practice of design. In particular,



within UDL, development takes place through

continuous cycles of design, implementation,

research, analysis, and redesign (Cobb 2001;

Collins 1992; Rappolt-Schlichtmann, Daley,

and Rose 2012). The focus is on linking design

processes to outcomes for individuals in authen-

tic, dynamic contexts. This structure offers fer-

tile ground whereby potential mechanisms of

engagement in learning can be hypothesized and

then tested—not by emphasizing average effects

andmean outcomes, but by focusing on the crea-

tion of conditions in which individuals can carve

out a learning experience that works for them.

In this way UDL is a continuously improv-

ing and evolving framework. We expect it to

change as knowledge of learning improves.

Undoubtedly, as UDL is applied to exhibit and

program design in museums, new knowledge

will be created about variability in learning in

authentic and informal contexts. The UDL

framework will evolve and be strengthened by

this work. But in the meantime, UDL may

prove to be a watershed in the ecology of

museum learning for visitors with disabilities, so

that museums increasingly become rich, engag-

ing, and unencumbered learning environments

for everyone. END

NOTES

1. The foundations of UDL from the neurosciences

and pedagogy are discussed at greater length in

books such asTeaching Every Student in the Digi-

tal Age (Rose andMeyer 2002);The Universally

Designed Classroom (Rose,Meyer, andHitchcock,

eds. 2005);A Practical Reader in Universal Design

for Learning (Rose andMeyer, eds. 2006); andA

Research Reader in Universal Design for Learning

(Rappolt-Schlichtmann, Daley, and Rose 2012).

2. We note that this example, while helpful in illus-

trating the consideration of so-called “invisible”

disabilities and approaches to considering the

barriers associated with text reading, which is a

challenge for many segments of the population, is

not incidental in terms of impact. Learners with

specific difficulties in reading represent the largest

population of students receiving special education

services in schools, by an overwhelmingmargin

(http://www.ideadata.org).

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