Making Computer Science Accessible

In an increasingly digital world, the elementary school students of today who learn to program will be positioned to re-imagine and build the future. As educators, it is essential to consider how such an important skill is made accessible for a diverse range of students, including those diagnosed with learning disabilities. In this article, the authors build on previous work conducted to connect computer programming to science learning. In Hansen et al. (2015), the authors described an engaging activity that challenged fourth-grade students to program a digital story or animation depicting science content such as how volcanoes form or the stages of chemical reactions. The authors now revisit the same activity through the lens of Universal Design for Learning (UDL) and discuss how the activity was adapted to support the learning of children with learning disabilities in the classroom.