Reflecting on Universal Design for Learning to Scaffold Online Learners' Executive Functions
Abstract: Executive functions are cognitive skills necessary for completing learning goals and tasks. Strong executive functions depend on a learner’s inhibitory control, working memory, and flexible thinking. A variety of factors may negatively impact learners' executive functions, from the presence of innate neurodevelopmental disorders and mental health conditions to the everyday stressors that learners of all ages may face. The Universal Design for Learning framework offers guidance to teacher-designers to improve their online course design and facilitation to scaffold and strengthen diverse learners' executive functions. This paper incorporates the UDL framework's four “Executive Functions checkpoints” to provide a structure for an experienced online teacher educator (the author) to reflect on ways to use what is known about executive function to scaffold learning in online graduate courses.