The morning literacy block has begun, and Ms. Williams is watching children in her classroom use a literacy app she just added to her reading centers. She sees one student open the app and create a story that features them as the main character, while another asks for her help to turn on the read aloud feature. The app reads the story aloud for them, pointing to each word as it is read, allowing full control over the text displays with rich image descriptions.
As literacy center rotations continue, she watches as multiple students, some of whom were previously reluctant readers, sustain their attention across multiple stories. Some tap pictures of themselves on each page to access the descriptions, even though they can see them. Some are listening to the read aloud feature, even though the book is on their reading level, so they can experience it with their favorite peer who reads on a different level.
Built-in Accessibility Features Can Help Every Student
Accessibility features such as these, and others like them, are essential components of Universal Design for Learning, or UDL, as defined by the Center for Applied Special Technology. When included in instructional tools, they can make learning more engaging, supportive, and personalized for every user. They can provide an essential bridge to the content for students who require them and a supportive scaffold for other students who may prefer them for a variety of reasons (e.g., varying attention spans, diverse linguistic backgrounds, or emerging executive functioning). When we design instruction from the margins, we often reveal a blueprint for something better. The question can no longer be whether accessibility features are necessary for educational tools, but rather how seamlessly do they anticipate and respond to human diversity and variability?
There are many tools to help educator-leaders implement UDL principles and identify accessible instructional tools, such as the Learner Variability Navigator (LVN). The LVN is a free tool grounded in learning science research that draws connections between learning factors such as attention, working memory, linguistic background, and social-emotional development across content areas and links them to evidence-based strategies that directly inform accessible instructional design decisions. The tool surfaces the specific learner needs that each UDL principle is designed to address, while its strategy library offers concrete, research-supported resources for addressing those needs in practice.
Research consistently shows that when accessibility features are embedded into digital educational tools, all learners benefit. A systematic review found that not only did UDL practices have positive outcomes for all learners, but that those outcomes were strongest when a UDL lens was applied proactively at the design stage rather than reactively (Akande et al., 2025). This finding holds up in practice, too. In a study in which non-disabled students were sorted into groups to watch either a video with accessibility features (i.e., the visual representation met Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) guidelines; W3C Web Accessibility Initiative, 2023) or one without, the students who viewed accessibility-aligned videos demonstrated stronger content retention and rated the videos as “attractive” (Rodriguez-Ascaso et al., 2018).
A recent Research-Practice-Industry Partnership between Digital Promise mathematics education researcher Lauren McMahon, her colleagues, and Texthelp illustrates this further. Together, they explored how teachers used an equation editing tool to design universally accessible math instruction. Teachers reported that the accessibility features made it easier to eliminate distractions and barriers while also providing multiple modes of expression for children to demonstrate their mathematical understanding (McMahon et al., 2024). This work helps show how features originally created to remove barriers for a portion of students can also enhance the experiences of their peers.
Benefits to Educators
In addition to improving learner outcomes, educational technology that has been designed with the full range of learners in mind also improves educators’ experiences, as it expands educators’ capacity to differentiate learning and increase learner engagement without risking burn out (Pozas & Letzel-Alt, 2023), which improves all students’ classroom experiences by extension. When tools include features such as multimodal output, adaptive input, real-time scaffolding, flexible pacing, and adjustable display options, teachers can spend less time finding other ways to layer on supports to compensate for rigid design and more time cultivating a rich, innovative, and joyful culture of learning.
Ensuring Educational Tools Are Accessible for All
Consider where neurodiverse voices can be brought in early and often to inform tool selections.
For leaders playing a role in selecting these tools for districts, schools, or classrooms, consider developing a plan and timeline for getting feedback from students, staff, or community members with a range of cognitive and physical lived experiences. Individuals with diverse experiences can help select or test out tools for accessibility before they are implemented across other students, classrooms, or districts. Beyond tool-specific input, consider if neurodiverse individuals can play a role on advisory boards (such as family, student, or community advisory board) so that their perspectives can help shape the ongoing implementation of educational technology across contexts and content areas. Involving them along the way signals that accessibility is a priority rather than an afterthought.
Consider intersections of neurodivergence and other learner profiles or cultures.
Learner identities intersect; for example, a student with dyslexia might also be a multilingual learner navigating academic content in their second or third language. A student with ADHD might also be a recent immigrant whose cultural background is largely absent from the materials in front of them. Consider where tools provide opportunities for built-in translation and vocabulary development, and consider who is represented in the characters and graphics used in the tool. Look closely at the characters, illustrations, and scenarios embedded in the tool. Is there a meaningful variety of physical appearances, cultural backgrounds, and family structures reflected? Representation is not just an equity consideration; it affects whether students feel seen, engaged, and able to connect with the material in front of them.
Utilize existing accessibility guidelines.
WCAG guidelines provide concrete, research-based standards for fonts, colors, contrast settings, alternative text, and audio features for all instructional presentation. Reviewing tools against these standards can help teams or implementers identify gaps and ensure we are addressing the needs of the full range of learners. As the research has highlighted, these features have benefits for all learners, not just those that need them most.
Classrooms and the individuals within them are ever evolving, and the tools we elect to put in front of our students must evolve with them. Including more neurodiverse voices throughout the process and ensuring we have considered intersectional identities and representation, while also evaluating tools against research-based accessibility guidelines, can help us create educational environments in which every learner can fully engage, connect, and thrive.
-----
Every learner is different, and the Learner Variability Navigator (LVN) can help educators find the tools and strategies that respond to that difference. Explore how the LVN and accessible edtech design can help cultivate better learning environments for all.