March Newsletter

April Webinar on Differentiated Instruction
The Access Center will host a webinar in late April on differentiated instruction. Dr. Melissa Storm, the Access Center’s northeast technical assistance liaison, will provide an overview of differentiation, a process through which teachers enhance learning by matching student characteristics to instruction and assessment. This Access Center professional development module, “Enhancing Your Instructional Skills Through Differentiation,” aims to provide specific differentiation strategies and considerations when implementing the process at the classroom, school, or district level, and Dr. Storm will share pieces of the training and provide information for further resources in this area.  Keep checking our website for further information about this webinar!

New State-Based Policies and Practices on Access
The interactive Access in Action section of the Access Center’s website has been upgraded! You are now able to more easily search an electronic catalog of state policies and practices relating to access. We are still accepting new documents, so if your state has noteworthy information to share, please submit documents and we will review them for potential inclusion in the catalog.

Access Center staff had the privilege of attending the Forum for Addressing Disproportionality sponsored by the National Center for Culturally Responsive Educational Systems (NCCRESt) in Denver, Colorado in mid-February. The Access Center presented a session, “Collaborative Initiatives for Increasing Inclusive Education,” along with Maureen Hawes, the North Central Regional Resource Center Project Coordinator. This session described the development of state-wide information sharing communities, provided an overview of knowledge communities and the concepts of communities of practice, and highlighted the work Ohio has done with the Big 8 Urban Districts Community of Practice. This presentation demonstrated how members from multiple areas of education (cross-disciplinary teams) can come together to share ideas and beliefs, ultimately generating increased outcomes for all students.

TA Matrix
The OSEP Technical Assistance & Dissemination Center Network, the Federal Resource Center, and the Regional Resource Centers have launched a new online database called The Matrix: Mapping Technical Assistance & Dissemination (TA&D) Activities Across the States.  This new database houses TA & D projects’ information including technical assistance activities provided by each project.  The purpose of the Matrix is to allow users to search for information on TA & D projects and the work they are engaged in nationwide.  Check out the activities going on in your region by visiting the website today!  You can access the TA Matrix by visiting http://www.rrfcnetwork.org/ and clicking on “Matrix” in the left-hand column.

Access Center Resource List
The Access Center’s newest product is a comprehensive list of the Information Briefs and Professional Development Modules that can be found on our website. This list includes a brief description of each resource in the topics of Foundational Information, Instructional and Learning Strategies, Reading and Language Arts, Mathematics, Science, and Universal Design for Learning.  The Access Center’s resources are not limited to the products on this list, however.  Many PowerPoint presentations, web resources, and resources submitted through Access in Action are also available on our website.

NAD Launches “Read Captions Across America”
The National Association of the Deaf (NAD) is launching its first-ever “Read Captions Across America” nationwide as a part of “Read Across America.” “Read Across America” is the nation’s largest reading celebration, sponsored by the 2.7 million-member National Education Association (NEA), and focuses the country's attention on motivating children to read, in addition to helping them master basic skills. “Read Captions Across America” is the first national reading event that puts emphasis on the importance of captioned media (DVD, video, CD-ROM, and Internet streaming) as a reading tool for children with or without a hearing loss.