ABSTRACT
Guidelines in most developed countries now include a statement that their national curriculum should be inclusive of all learners and responsive to their diverse learning needs. This chapter examines ways in which curriculum content can be adapted when necessary to accommodate some of the most significant differences among learners. The potential difficulties and tensions created by modifying curricula are also discussed. Studies have found that teachers believe that modifying the curriculum is the most effective inclusionary strategy (e.g, simplifying or omitting content for some learners while providing extension work for the most able), but they find this very difficult to do in practice. Often they anticipate that some students will have difficulty with parts of the curriculum, but they still try to cover exactly the same material in the same way and in the same period of time with all students. They make very few adjustments or accommodations. This chapter describes how curriculum content and learning objectives can be modified while still teaching a common core programme. The concept of a Universal Design for Learning (UDL) is introduced here.
