New Opportunities for SEL in Updates to Universal Design for Learning Guidelines

Key Points

• Intentionally integrating social and emotional learning (SEL) across classrooms and school days is increasingly recognized as essential to better prepare students for life beyond graduation.
• Studies show SEL increases academic achievement, so it makes sense that incorporating SEL activities and experiences can help optimize teaching and learning for every student.
• Universal Design for Learning (UDL), a research-backed framework intended to accommodate learner differences to maximize learning for all, recently released updated guidelines with six additional prompts prominently featuring SEL.

Intentionally integrating social and emotional learning (SEL) across academics and school days rather than, say, making it one department’s responsibility or squeezing it in “if there’s time,” is increasingly recognized as essential to better prepare students for life beyond graduation. Our own experience at Ori Learning backs this up. As we talk to education leaders and peek at snapshots of the educational landscape, we see effectively doing so is top of mind for district leaders. This is on top of other challenges they face, like overstretched workforces, funding cuts, learning loss, and school safety.

Studies show SEL increases academic achievement. So, it makes sense incorporating SEL activities and experiences can help optimize teaching and learning for every student. Universal Design for Learning (UDL) is a research-backed framework intended to accommodate learner differences to maximize learning for all. The UDL Guidelines, initially released in 2008, are a tool to put this framework into action. The latest iteration, UDL Guidelines 3.0, was released July 2024, following a collaborative and iterative process begun in July 2020. Updates include six additional prompts, the term used in this newer version to replace checkpoints.

Looking at these additions, it should come as no surprise SEL features prominently in each.

As outlined below, educators can breathe a sigh of relief. These additions are less “another thing to do” and more focused on building SEL competencies into what they are already doing while expanding equitable learning opportunities for all.

Addition 1: Nurture joy and play.

This addition is a reminder that joy and play go hand in hand with effective teaching and learning.

Encouraging students to act and reflect in ways that draw on their innate creativity, playfulness, and curiosity promotes students’ abilities to cultivate knowledge, mindsets, self-regulation, and values they will need to succeed in life. For example, studies focused on arts education highlight how practices like creating, performing, presenting, responding, and connecting are foundational in building the SEL competencies of self-awareness, self-management, social awareness, and relationship skills.

Thus, designing and encouraging joy and play across learning in math, reading, science, and beyond can positively impact academic achievement in those subjects and more.

Addition 2: Foster belonging and community.

Research reminds us how important it is for students to feel comfortable and free to express themselves with their peers and their teachers. A classroom environment that supports students to be themselves is one of three components of an SEL-focused classroom, according to CASEL. By encouraging educators and students to design and participate in learning that instills a sense of belonging, regardless of subject, SEL competencies like relationship skills and responsible decision-making are fostered as well.

Addition 3: Practice empathy.

Empathy is integral to fostering that sense of belonging and supportive community described above. When teachers and students are more empathetic, it is easier for them to engage with learning, ask for and offer help, and give others space to do the same. In doing so, educators can instill self-awareness as well as awareness of others’ perspectives, both SEL competencies, alongside academic knowledge and skills.

Addition 4: Authentically represent a diversity of perspectives and identities.

“Who?” That is a central question spanning updates to the UDL Guidelines.

“Who will be engaging with these learning materials? Who do students see when they look at the materials? Who don’t they see? How are those on the page more than just one-dimensional figures? What biases and stereotypes come to mind while learning and need to be interrogated?”

This addition prompts educators and students to acknowledge we are all multi-faceted, with different identities, interests, and strengths. By representing diverse perspectives and identities in learning materials or during discussions, opportunities are created to recognize and examine social norms, promote critical thinking, and broaden perspectives. In doing so, SEL competencies like social awareness, relationship skills, and responsible decision-making are more embedded in the current UDL Guidelines.

Additions 5 & 6: Address biases in the use of language and symbols and those related to modes of expression and communication

Delving into feedback shaping these additions, it is evident stakeholders wanted users of the Guidelines to remember that learning is dynamic and that ways of demonstrating progress today or effectively engaging students with material tomorrow must be dynamic as well. Thus, Additions 5 and 6 call on students and teachers to regularly reflect on the personal strengths of themselves and others and check in on how their individual learning and needs are evolving.

From there, and against the backdrop of fostering community in the classroom, these additions also encourage students to use their voices to advocate for themselves and teachers to be open to feedback that may mean experimenting with new approaches to meet changing needs. Thus, SEL competencies like self-management, responsible decision-making, and relationships skills are put into practice while growing academically as well.

In Conclusion

This latest iteration of the UDL Guidelines followed calls from practitioners and researchers to more explicitly connect identity to learner variability and more directly address systemic bias across teaching and learning. Thus, updates to the guidelines focus on leveraging strengths to create more just, equitable learning.

Research shows SEL promotes numerous positive outcomes, so it should come as no surprise that incorporating SEL is part of UDL Guidelines 3.0. This is good news for educators, as it further empowers them to more fully embed SEL for the benefit of every student.

Disclaimer: The views in this blog are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of CASEL.

Elizabeth Bruce’s unconventional path to ed tech began in Virginia Beach Public Schools, where she taught high school chemistry. While completing a master’s degree in education in Globalization and Educational Change and in the years that followed, much of her work as a researcher focused internationally, working with humanitarian and development organizations across diverse areas including ed tech. Once the COVID-19 pandemic transformed ed tech’s role in schools globally, she turned her attention back to U.S. classrooms, using the contextual lens she honed working abroad to consider how online and blended solutions can positively impact learning in the nation’s classrooms.

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