Accessible Arts Education

ACCESSIBLE ARTS EDUCATION

Principles, Habits, and Strategies to Unleash Every Student’s Creativity and Learning

ACCESSIBLE ARTS EDUCATION

Copyright © 2026 by Solution Tree Press

Materials appearing here are copyrighted. With one exception, all rights are reserved. Readers may reproduce only those pages marked “Reproducible.” Otherwise, no part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means (electronic, photocopying, recording, or otherwise) without prior written permission of the publisher. This book, in whole or in part, may not be included in a large language model, used to train AI, or uploaded into any AI system.

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Bernard, Rhoda (Professor of music education) author

Title: Accessible arts education : principles, habits, and strategies to unleash every student’s creativity and learning / Rhoda Bernard.

Description: Bloomington, IN : Solution Tree Press, [2026] | Includes bibliographical references and index.

Identifiers: LCCN 2025009012 (print) | LCCN 2025009013 (ebook) | ISBN 9798893740332 paperback | ISBN 9798893740349 ebook

Subjects: LCSH: Children with disabilities--Education--United States | Arts--Study and teaching--United States

Classification: LCC LC4025 .B47 2026 (print) | LCC LC4025 (ebook)

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2025009012

LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2025009013

Solution Tree

Cameron L. Rains, CEO

Edmund M. Ackerman, President

Solution Tree Press

Publisher: Kendra Slayton

Associate Publisher: Todd Brakke

Acquisitions Director: Hilary Goff

Editorial Director: Laurel Hecker

Art Director: Rian Anderson

Managing Editor: Sarah Ludwig

Copy Chief: Jessi Finn

Production Editor: Paige Duke

Copy Editor: Anne Marie Watkins

Text and Cover Designer: Fabiana Cochran

Acquisitions Editor: Carol Collins

Content Development Specialist: Amy Rubenstein

Associate Editor: Elijah Oates

Editorial Assistant: Madison Chartier

To educators—your devotion to learning, your subjects, and your students inspires me every day. I feel privileged to be among your ranks and to learn from and with all of you.

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

It is not hyperbole to say that writing this book has been the realization of a lifelong dream. I remember first getting to know someone who had written several academic books and feeling driven to find a way, someday, to do the same. It has taken more than thirty years since I met that person for this book to be published.

I am deeply grateful for the many people who have supported me in various ways to make this project possible.

First, there are those who provided me with space, time, and resources. Thank you to Berklee College of Music for granting me my first-ever sabbatical leave so that I could step away from the day-to-day treadmill. Thank you to my Berklee colleagues Dr. Cecil Adderley, Dr. Lenora Helm Hammonds, and Dr. Marcela Castillo-Rama for their encouragement before and during the sabbatical. Thank you to my team at the Berklee Institute for Accessible Arts Education for taking on additional responsibilities and continuing our operations in my absence. Special thanks to administrative team members Oriana Inferrera, Marlene Markard, Daniel Martinez del Campo, and Eliza Shaughnessy for stepping

up with thoughtfulness, care, grace, and a sense of humor. Thank you to Berklee’s Office of Faculty Development for the Chalk Hill Artist Residency so that I could gather with three delightful colleagues in beautiful Healdsburg, California. Thank you to my dear friend Julie Duty for hosting me for a weeklong writing retreat at her wonderful barn in Arizona.

Then, there are those who contributed in some way to my writing process. Thank you to Carol Collins, my acquisitions editor at Solution Tree Press, whose cold email and warm conversation were the ideal catalysts to bring this book from concept to reality. Thank you to my fellow coworkers for the productive pleasure of our weekly sessions and lunches. A very special thank-you to the “women of courage,” Corinne McKamey and Cleti Cervoni, for your insightful feedback and wisdom in response to drafts of literally every word written here.

I’d like to thank my chosen family for their personal support. Thank you to Jeff Wallach, Jocelyn Williams, Carolyn Costle, Tom Tyler (who proclaimed, “Of all the people who say that they’re going to write a book, when you say it, Rhoda, I am sure that it’s true!”), Monica Bhattacharyya, Jen Harris, David Condon, Ed Perlmutter, Paul Dixon, Rachel Bowman, Laurie Ellington, Jennifer Huth, Joanna Messing, Dom Nicholas, and Gail and Betsy Leondar-Wright. Thank you for surrounding me with love and for being interested in my work (or feigning that interest very convincingly!). I am truly fortunate to have you in my life. Thank you for making this journey with me—it’s much better with your company.

Finally, thank you to all the artists who shared their experiences for this book. Here’s a bit about each of them in their own words.

• Adrian Anantawan is a violinist and educator, the chair of music at Milton Academy, and the artistic director of Shelter Music Boston. He is also an associate professor in the String Department at Berklee College of Music, where he founded the Music Inclusion Ensemble. Adrian performs, teaches, and speaks around the world as an advocate for disability and the arts.

• Mark Beer is an actor and director who lives in the United Kingdom. He was born with second-degree cerebral palsy and is a wheelchair user. He has worked professionally for over forty years in theater, film, television, and radio. Mark has toured the United Kingdom and Ireland in a wide variety of character roles. Most recently, Mark has performed in London’s West End.

• Megan Bent is a visual artist who is drawn to image-making processes that reflect and embrace her disabled experience, especially interdependence, impermanence, care, and slowness. Her work has been exhibited throughout the United States and abroad. She has been an artist in residence in the United States and was a recipient of the Wynn Newhouse Award in 2023.

• Ella Bouvard is a para-athlete and musician. Her main sports are triathlon, wheelchair rugby, and rugby. Ella is a self-taught guitarist and singer and often performs at pub shows and summer festivals.

• Rae Brazill is a songwriter, designer, and director from Leeds, United Kingdom. As the front person of the alt-rock quartet Artio, they write songs that explore their existence as a whole and that are deeply rooted in their identity as a neurodivergent, queer person, addressing personal and social issues.

• Jeremy Andrew Davis is a multihyphenate writer, film director, disability advocate, representation consultant, entrepreneur, and social media content creator. He is on a mission to transform disability representation, shaping the cultures of tomorrow through the stories told today.

• Grace Tussing Douglas is a blind musical theater actress and sound designer. Through her art and design, she advocates for disability representation and accessibility in the performing arts.

• Sophia Grech , internationally celebrated mezzo-soprano, is based in the United Kingdom. She has received great acclaim for her performances at leading concert halls,

opera houses, and international festivals worldwide, leading to regular invitations to give master classes around the world. In 2015, Sophia was diagnosed with autism, and she is now an appointed ambassador on behalf of associated organizations worldwide alongside her artistic career.

• Cherylee Houston, MBE (Member of the Order of the British Empire), is a British actress known for her roles as Izzy Armstrong in Coronation Street , Britain’s longest-running soap series, and as Maz, a character in the comedy series Tinsel Girl . She is a self-professed accidental advocate and activist for deaf, disabled, and neurodivergent artists and works to raise awareness for accessibility issues. At twenty-three, she was diagnosed with hypermobile Ehlers-Danlos syndrome (type 3) and has been a wheelchair user ever since.

• Shane Lowe is the percussionist and music director of the bands Midair Decision and The Blues Pilots, as well as for the Latina pop artist Precious Perez. Shane specializes in hand percussion and has led performances at prestigious venues such as the Kennedy Center in Washington, DC, and the Lincoln Center in New York.

• Ben Lunn is a composer, conductor, and musicologist based in Scotland. His works have been performed throughout Europe, and he has academic writing published internationally. Ben is a cofounder of the Disabled Artist Network, guest artistic director of Hebrides Ensemble, and associate composer at Drake Music Scotland, and his music is published in Universal Edition.

• Amy Claire Mills is a textile artist, curator, and producer from Australia who lives and works on Gadigal and Wangal land. Her practice explores advocacy, identity, and resistance, with a focus on disability culture and its social and political dimensions, engaging both as an artist and subject.

• Jennifer Msumba is a Florida-based Boston native, an award-winning musician on the autism spectrum, and an ambassador for the Doug Flutie Jr. Foundation for Autism. Her music mixes folk and acoustic indie-pop elements, with lyrics that take you into her unique world and leave you better for it.

• Precious Perez is a blind Puerto Rican singer, songwriter, author, and disability advocate. Her goal is to uplift all the communities she represents by being the first blind Latina at the forefront of the Latinx music industry.

• Rebecca Faith Quinn is an autism advocate, actress, and full-time content creator whose projects highlight neurodiversity and disability. She has been recognized as a semifinalist and quarterfinalist in screenwriting competitions.

• Briana Raucci is a Connecticut-based film and digital photographer, visual artist, and designer. Diagnosed with cerebral palsy at the age of nine months and epilepsy at age twelve, Briana is passionate about disability advocacy through art.

• Matthew Raynor is an avid traveler, commercial fisherman, and photographer who, before his accident, chronicled his time at sea through photography. On April 18, 2019, Matthew suffered a severe spinal injury resulting in paralysis below the collarbone, with no hand movement and limited arm mobility. Despite his disability, Matthew continues to capture the beauty of Mother Nature through drone photography and other means.

• Finnegan Shannon is an American multidisciplinary artist based in Brooklyn, New York, whose practice focuses on disability culture in inaccessible spaces. Finnegan is most known for their protest pieces, such as gallery benches criticizing a lack of seating and lounges for those who cannot access stairs.

• Stephen Tonti is a native of New Orleans, Louisiana, and an adult ADHD advocate, educator, influencer, and public speaker. When not working in complex mental health, Stephen is a writer and producer for film and television. He is the cofounder of Attention Different, a company dedicated to ADHD advocacy, education, and creative content.

• Madge Woollard is a pianist and piano teacher based in the United Kingdom. Diagnosed with autism as an adult, Madge specializes in teaching neurodivergent students.

Solution Tree Press would like to thank the following reviewers:

Sarah Kranz

K–5 Art Educator

New Glarus Elementary School

New Glarus, Wisconsin

Lana Powers Department Chair for Business, FACS, Fine Arts and Technology

Evansville Central High School

Evansville, Indiana

Jennifer Steele Assistant Director, Athletics and Activities

Fort Smith Public Schools

Fort Smith, Arkansas

Laurie H. Warner Founder, Advocate, and Educational Consultant Beyond the Gray Area, LLC Anthem, Arizona

Hannah Winsnes Instructor, School of Arts and Education

Red Deer Polytechnic Red Deer, Alberta, Canada

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Rhoda Bernard, EdD, is an internationally renowned expert in accessible arts education. She is the managing director of the Berklee Institute for Accessible Arts Education and the assistant chair of the Music Education Department at Berklee College of Music. Previously, Dr. Bernard was the chair of the Music Education Department at Boston Conservatory at Berklee. Dr. Bernard regularly presents keynotes and research at conferences throughout the United States and abroad, and she provides professional development workshops for educators in local, national, and international forums. Dr. Bernard has written many book chapters and articles in peer-reviewed journals.

She was recently honored with the Irene Buck Service to Arts Education Award from Arts|Learning. A vocalist and pianist who specializes in jazz music and Jewish music in Yiddish and Hebrew, Dr. Bernard performs regularly with a number of klezmer bands and has recorded two CDs with the band Klezamir.

Dr. Bernard holds a bachelor of arts cum laude in government from Harvard University and a bachelor of music with academic honors in jazz voice from the New England Conservatory. She earned both her master of education and doctor of education degrees from the Harvard Graduate School of Education.

To learn more about Dr. Bernard’s work, follow @rhodabernard41 on Instagram and @rhoda-bernard-075a6710b on LinkedIn.

To book Rhoda Bernard for professional development, contact pd@SolutionTree.com .

FOREWORD

BY STEPHEN MARK SHORE

Along time ago, in a land far, far away—not really, just a few miles away—I was invited to a lawyer’s home in Brookline, Massachusetts, to meet a group of people interested in giving music lessons to autistic individuals. It started small with just a few people sharing ideas about teaching autistic individuals to play a musical instrument. “What could be better?” I thought. As an autistic person who studied music education through doctoral-level coursework and who has a studio of autistic music students, I thought this seemed the way to go!

When I was diagnosed as autistic, nonspeaking, and “too sick” for inpatient treatment at two and a half, my parents refuted medical professional recommendations that I be institutionalized. Instead, they chose an intensive home-based early intervention program. Among many strategies they employed, imitation and musical interaction were included. After my parents’ attempts to get me to imitate them failed, they flipped it around and imitated me—building a base of connection from which they could then develop a trusting relationship. Meeting the person where they are and building a connection are two critical prerequisites for constructing a trusting relationship from which

to develop meaningful interaction to do meaningful work with an individual. I find people who go through these first two steps— be it automatically or from being taught—are best at being with autistic and otherwise neurodivergent people. It’s an effective approach with everyone, actually.

Music and the other arts are particularly good at initially connecting with autistic and otherwise neurodivergent individuals because they access a different part of the brain than what is used for verbal communication. Even from my nonspeaking days before the age of four, music was an integral part of my upbringing. Classical and folk music played all day and late into the night in my home. My parents and I would move, do tasks, learn with music—we did everything to music.

At age six, I started piano lessons, from which I learned, most importantly, how not to teach autistic or otherwise neurodivergent individuals to play the piano. My early experiences in receiving music lessons drive my mission to contrast with “typical music lesson strategy.” One way I do this is to involve my students in developing, and later employing, the materials that will be instrumental in learning notation. While this particular technique was developed for autistic students, it can be generalized to neurotypical students as well. The same is true with the strategies you’ll learn in this book.

Accessible Arts Education teaches the concepts of accessible instruction and generalizes them to arts education as a whole. The multitude of strategies in this text transform learning into a highly visual, experiential process in which student and educator cocreate together. Rather than an “I teach and you learn” philosophy, teaching music and the other arts becomes collaborative. This treasure of a book has my highest recommendation and is a must-read for anyone wishing to make fulfilling and productive learning in music and the other arts the rule rather than the exception for autistic and otherwise neurodivergent individuals.

Stephen Mark Shore, EdD, is an internationally known professor, author, presenter, consultant, and autistic individual.

[My professor] was also just really willing to listen. He was one of those teachers who, no matter what I was struggling with, he never dismissed those struggles. He always just sat and listened and would work through it with me. Would process it with me. To get to the root of whatever I was struggling with, so that we could understand it and work on it together. And that was a very safe experience for me as an autistic performer, because it felt like, “Oh, I have a safe space to be autistic in this space. I don’t have to pretend like I get it. You’ll be OK if I don’t get it.” And that was so comforting.

—Rebecca Faith Quinn, autism advocate, actress, and content creator

INTRODUCTION

When I think back on my years as a public school student in the United States in the 1970s and early 1980s, I remember an education that reflected where thinking and practice in the field were at the time. Specifically, most of my teachers (with a couple notable exceptions) used what I would describe today as a unidimensional pedagogical process to teach us concepts, facts, and skills. By this, I mean that they used only one approach, only one set of activities, or only one means of assessment.

For example, we learned the concept of time signatures in music class through the following singular process.

1. The teacher told us that the top number in the time signature represents the number of beats per measure.

2. We wrote that definition in a notebook.

3. The teacher told us that the bottom number in the time signature represents the kind of note that gets one beat.

4. We wrote that definition in a notebook.

5. For homework, we were required to memorize the two definitions.

6. We were asked to write out those definitions on a pencil-and-paper test.

When it comes to learning facts, spelling is a good example. We were taught the correct spelling of words through one—and only one—process.

1. Every Monday, our teacher gave us a weekly list of ten spelling words. The teacher wrote the words on the board.

2. We wrote the words in a notebook.

3. For homework, we were required to memorize how to spell the words.

4. There was a pencil-and-paper test at the end of every week that was always in the same format: The teacher would recite each of that week’s spelling words, and we would write them down.

Note-taking is an example of a skill we were taught in a unidimensional way.

1. The teacher sat at the overhead projector and wrote the notes they wanted us to take in a specific format on a transparency. The notes were projected on a screen.

2. We copied the content and formatting of the teacher’s notes into a notebook. The copies were required to be exact replicas of the teacher’s notes.

3. The teacher collected our notebooks and graded them based on the accuracy of our copying.

These and other unidimensional pedagogical processes throughout my public schooling led to a situation where students who could learn effectively through the particular pedagogical process that was employed and demonstrate what they had learned through the singular form of assessment that was utilized were successful. They were viewed—and came to see themselves—as intelligent, hardworking, “good” students. On the flip side, the students who could not learn effectively through that pedagogical process or demonstrate what they had learned through that form of assessment were not successful. They may

have come to understand that they were not learning “correctly.” They may have been expected—even required—to alter the way they learn to meet their teachers where they were. They may have come to see themselves as not intelligent, not hardworking, or even “bad” or “lazy” students.

Specifically, related to the preceding examples, my classmates who did not learn effectively by memorizing facts would have experienced great difficulty learning and understanding the concept of time signatures. Individuals who needed more time to process letters would have done poorly on the spelling tests. Students who struggled with pencil-and-paper tasks or had trouble translating their thoughts into writing would have found the tests and note-taking tasks to be extremely challenging.

I was fortunate to be able to learn effectively and show what I had learned and was able to do through the unidimensional pedagogical processes and forms of assessment of my public school education. As a result, my learning was seen, appreciated, and validated; I was a successful student, and I excelled in school. But what about my classmates who were not considered successful students? What was going on for them?

Making Learning Visible

I suspect a large number of my classmates who were not considered successful students were actually learning. However, because they weren’t learning or demonstrating their learning in the way that aligned with the singular pedagogical processes employed in their classes, their learning was not seen, appreciated, or validated by their teachers. Put another way, I believe these students were learning, but their learning was invisible to most of their teachers.

Learning is an achievement that deserves to be marveled at— it merits acknowledgment, validation, and celebration. It is one of the most awe-inspiring things we do. When we learn, we gain understanding, develop skills, grow knowledge, embrace

perspectives, and think differently. We encounter, synthesize, and assimilate new ideas, new works, new processes, and new activities. Learning is a powerful, mesmerizing endeavor. I, like many of you, became an educator because of my intense wonder at and fascination with learning. I still feel that wonder and fascination every day, after more than thirty years in the field. Learning continues to be fresh and exciting. It hasn’t gotten old or stale.

Unfortunately, invisible learning can lead to the mistaken assumption that learning has not occurred at all. Personally, this elicits a strong reaction in me. I find it to be nothing short of tragic when this mistaken assumption takes hold. When I think about the students in my classes back in the 1970s and early 1980s who were actually learning (though the majority of their teachers could not see their learning because it was invisible to them) and about the assumptions teachers made about whether they had learned, whether they could learn, and whether they were “good” students, I am deeply saddened. I also feel angry. Mind you, I am not angry at the teachers; I am angry at the situation. I feel angry that common thinking about education at the time created the conditions for some of my classmates’ learning not to be visible to most of their teachers.

Invisible learning is not any person’s fault; rather, it is a function of the ways that the educational process and learning are conceptualized and, more specifically, the limitations of those conceptualizations. For example, the invisible learning that took place during my public school education likely stemmed from two main sources: (1) the widely established and agreed-on practice of employing a singular pedagogical process to teach concepts, facts, and skills and (2) the commonly held understanding at the time that it was the student’s responsibility to change the way they learn to connect with that pedagogical process.

What I am describing here is, of course, just one sort of instance where learning was invisible to others. There have been, are, and will be many more occasions of invisible learning.

When understandings of the educational process and of learning are limited, it becomes more likely that learning outside of the narrow confines of those understandings will take place. And that learning will end up being invisible.

Thankfully, the fertile ground of the late 1900s and early 2000s in the field of education has cultivated numerous advances that have expanded the ways the educational process is conceptualized and, in turn, have made more learning visible. These include (but are not limited to):

• The theory of multiple intelligences (Gardner, 1983)

• Critical pedagogy (Freire, 1970)

• Teaching for understanding (Blythe, 1998)

• Differentiated instruction (Tomlinson, 1995)

• Universal Design for Learning (UDL; Orkwis & McLane, 1998)

• Culturally sustaining pedagogy (Paris & Alim, 2017)

Today, it is generally acknowledged and understood that people learn in different ways, and the wide range of ways in which people learn requires that teachers engage a multidimensional set of pedagogical processes and utilize multiple forms of assessment. Thanks to this broadened understanding of the processes of teaching and learning, learning is far more visible today than it was back in the 1970s and 1980s. For that, I am grateful. It fuels my mission and gives me hope.

Making learning visible has been the laser focus of my career as an educator, leader, and researcher. I have devoted my professional life to developing and providing arts education opportunities where every person’s learning can be seen, heard, acknowledged, celebrated, and marveled at. With like-minded colleagues around the world, I have developed the frameworks and practices of accessible arts education. Accessible arts education seeks to make learning visible by striving to eliminate barriers to student engagement, participation, and learning. Today, these frameworks and practices have been embraced

by educators working in all settings, teaching all subject areas, and working with students of all ages, backgrounds, and learning schemes.

Honoring the Origins of Accessible Arts Education

While accessible arts education is widely relevant and applicable to all subject areas, educational situations, and student populations, its origins lie in the many challenges that arts educators have experienced when working with students with disabilities and diagnoses. Not having received pedagogical training for teaching students with diverse learning strengths, challenges, and needs for support, arts educators have long felt ill-equipped to reach every student. Since the 1990s, my colleagues and I have strived to meet this need by developing tools, frameworks, practices, and habits of mind that can help educators (arts and non-arts alike) to make their teaching more accessible for all students. These efforts are ongoing and generative: Teachers in all settings continue to require additional training, resources, and support when it comes to accessibility, and a growing community of educators and leaders continues to create and disseminate new approaches and materials.

This book honors the origins of accessible arts education in two key ways.

1. By including first-person perspectives and contributions from disabled artists and arts educators

2. By respecting the wishes of the disability community in the language that is used

The following sections look at each of these in greater detail.

First-Person Perspectives

From my very first conception of this book, it has been extremely important to me that people with disabilities are

included in the text in meaningful ways. As I explore in more depth in chapter 2 (page 57), the voices of people with disabilities are often absent from publications, events, and conversations that have to do with disability, leading to the unfortunate situation where nondisabled people write about and speak for disabled people.

To address this issue and spotlight the first-person perspectives of people with disabilities, this book features artwork by a disabled artist at the beginning of each chapter, as well as vignettes and quotes by disabled artists and arts educators throughout the text. You can learn more about all of these contributors and their work in their biographies in the book’s acknowledgments (page vi). I am deeply grateful to all of these individuals for their generosity, honesty, and vulnerability. Our collaborations have been joyful, fascinating, moving, and productive. I am proud to have gotten to know you and to share your words and your artwork in these pages.

The vignettes were developed through a narrative interview process where I asked each individual open-ended questions about their art and their arts education. I transcribed these interviews in full and analyzed them through a grounded-theory approach, through which I uncovered resonant themes and identified excerpts to propose for inclusion in the book. I shared the proposed excerpts with the interviewees, and we jointly edited them when necessary. Once we finalized the excerpts, the interviewees gave their express permission to include their words in the book.

The process for the creation of the artwork was an iterative one that included several discussions between artist Megan Bent and me about the role of the artwork in relation to the text. I shared materials from the book with Megan, and she constructed drafts of black-and-white prints for my review. Together, we arrived at a consensus about the final pieces that have been included in the book, with her permission.

A Note About Language and Disability

Some of the most common questions I hear from educators have to do with language. They want to know what they should say when speaking about disability or about students with disabilities and diagnoses. They are also anxious to know what they should not say in those instances and what words or phrases they should avoid. They fear making a mistake, saying the wrong thing, and offending someone. Over the years, I have developed— and continue to update—classes, professional development modules, talking points, and resources about language and disability, and I always devote at least a few minutes of every session or workshop that I give to the topic.

Language about disability is complex because it is not static; it is constantly changing. Some words and phrases that were once acceptable are considered offensive today, and it can be very challenging to remain current and ensure that you use language that is appropriate and will not lead to any issues.

When it comes to language, I seek to respect the wishes of the disability community in two main ways. First, I consult the writings and presentations of disability self-advocates for information about language and disability. Two individuals whom I have gotten to know personally, Lydia X. Z. Brown and Emily Ladau, have each created a number of particularly helpful blog posts, presentation videos, and publications. These resources help me stay abreast of evolutions in the language that should be used in relation to disability. Second, I respect the ways that disabled individuals and their families refer to themselves and to their family member with a disability. It is my firm conviction that it is never anyone’s place to tell another person how to describe themselves or their family members. People have every right to use whatever language they wish when they speak about themselves or members of their families, even if the language they choose includes words or phrases that disability self-advocates have deemed offensive. I believe it is absolutely

essential that we respect other people’s rights to represent themselves and their families.

For the purposes of the present book, I would like to address two linguistic approaches that are particularly relevant here: person-first language and identity-first language. When we use person-first language, the word person is the first word in the statement, and when we use identity-first language, the disability or diagnosis comes first. Table I.1 presents a few examples of person-first and identity-first language.

TABLE I.1: Person-First and Identity-First Language

Person-First Language

Person with a disability

Person who uses a wheelchair

Person with dyslexia

Person with autism

Identity-First Language

Disabled person

Wheelchair user

Dyslexic person

Autistic person

While person-first language was part of the People First movement of the 1970s and was written into the Americans With Disabilities Act in 1990 and the Individuals With Disabilities Education Act in 1997, there have always been some individuals— often disability self-advocates—who push back against person-first language and strongly prefer identity-first language (Wooldridge, 2023).

The aim of person-first language, initially, was to use a linguistic construction that would minimize the potential stigma of disability. Some individuals and organizations choose to use person-first language for that very reason. However, individuals who prefer identity-first language argue that person-first language serves to minimize their disability. They believe that their disability is integral to who they are; they are not ashamed of it, and they wish to foreground it in how they are described.

My advice is that, whenever possible, we should ask the person what they prefer and respect their wishes. If we are going to speak about one individual or a small group of people, it is feasible to ask them whether we should use person-first or identity-first language. When it comes to a larger group, there may be representatives of that group to whom we can turn for guidance.

My own use of person-first and identity-first language has changed over time. Earlier in my career, I only used person-first language. As the years passed and my work grew and developed, I got to know a number of individuals who rejected person-first language and insisted that I use identity-first language. Today, I deliberately alternate between person-first and identity-first language when I speak and write. In this way, I intend to demonstrate that I understand and value both linguistic conventions and that I seek to include everyone by putting forth both perspectives when I communicate. Throughout this book, as you have already seen, I will use both person-first and identity-first language in my references to people with disabilities or disabled people.

Using This Book

This book will introduce educators to the principles, habits of mind, framework, strategies, and approaches of accessible arts education so they can better reach every learner. Although the materials in this book stem from arts education, they apply to all subject matter, within and beyond the arts. They can be used at all levels, in all educational settings, in all kinds of teaching and learning situations, and with all students, no matter how they learn best.

Chapters include:

• Artwork by a disabled artist

• At least one vignette or quote from a disabled artist or arts educator

• Valuable, cutting-edge information from research and practice about the chapter’s topic

• Strategies for educators that can be used in all subject areas, in all educational settings, and with all learners

• Reproducibles for educators to copy and use that support the planning and implementation of accessible arts education strategies

Chapter 1 introduces the principles and habits of mind of accessible arts education and provides what I refer to as high-percentage teaching strategies to identify and remove barriers to accessibility. These strategies are easy to implement and have a high likelihood of increasing the accessibility of educational experiences for all students.

Chapter 2 explores issues of power in education and puts forth strategies to encourage students to exercise control and agency in teaching and learning settings. While it can feel risky for educators to relinquish some of their power in their teaching situations, when students experience having control and agency, new learning pathways become possible. This chapter provides some simple ways to encourage student control and agency while still maintaining overall authority and ensuring that students work to meet the learning objectives you have set for them.

Chapter 3 delves into student anxiety as a barrier to learning and outlines strategies to create a safe learning space. Many individuals experience anxiety in school for a wide variety of reasons. Research confirms what we all know from our experience as educators: When students are anxious, they are unable to engage, participate, or learn effectively. The strategies in this chapter can help educators alleviate their students’ anxiety so they can feel safe and ready to learn.

Chapter 4 examines learning and pedagogy and provides strategies for engaging multiple learning modalities and pedagogical approaches to better reach every learner. The tremendous variation among learners demands that educators take a multidimensional approach to their teaching. This chapter presents specific tools that all educators can use to expand the range of learning modalities and pedagogical approaches they use every day and increase the likelihood that students will be able to engage, participate, and learn successfully.

Chapter 5 narrows in on the unique value of the visual modality and offers strategies to support learning with visual tools. I explore the reasons that the visual modality is the most potent of all the learning modalities, how educators can use the visual modality to its fullest and adapt it for students who are blind or low vision, and what to do in those cases where the visual modality alone may not be effective.

Chapter 6 addresses sensory issues that may arise in educational settings and offers strategies to anticipate and alleviate them through careful inventorying, analyzing, and planning, as well as through creating procedures and policies. I share some specific tools that educators can use to modify their learning environment, as well as particular materials that can support students in the moment when sensory issues occur.

Chapter 7 focuses on implementation. It features advice for you as you begin your accessible arts education journey, vignettes that illustrate real-world applications of various strategies and tools, and my wishes for you and your students going forward.

Making Learning More Visible

I spend a lot of time with educators, and not just arts educators. In fact, I regularly interact with many educators who teach at all levels, all subject areas, and in all settings. I have been doing so for quite some time—over the course of my career.

In my interactions with educators, it is clear they are dedicated to reaching every student in meaningful ways in all aspects of the educational process. But often, they do not possess the training or support to turn their dedication into action. As a result, they are ravenous for more ways to think about and execute their practice to make it more accessible for every student. Accessible arts education is exactly what they need to satisfy their hunger. After they have studied accessible arts education in some way—through a workshop, course, study group, or conference— teachers often contact me to share some of the ways that implementing these strategies and approaches has transformed their teaching for the better. I also hear from teachers who are excited to share how they have utilized what they learned from these principles and practices to develop their own strategies for particular students or situations.

The field of education is vibrant and generative in ways that give me great hope when it comes to making learning more visible. Thanks to the principles, habits of mind, and pedagogical strategies of accessible arts education, today’s educators—no matter the setting or subject area—are better equipped than ever to see, recognize, marvel at, and celebrate every student’s learning. As a result, learning is becoming more visible for more students every day.

In the Artist’s Words

I think [my poetry teacher] was the first one to use the word potential in a non-stinging way. Right, so like other people would be like, “Oh, you have so much potential if you could just . . .” Right? “Stop making excuses, Tonti, you have so much potential.” [My poetry teacher] was the first one to go, “In you, I see so much potential, and I am thrilled to see where it goes.” That’s why—her explanation for paying attention to me was, “You have so much potential I’m thrilled by it. . . . What excites me about you is the potential to burst.” And I was like, “Oh—positive attention!” (S. Tonti, personal communication, September 17, 2024)

Stephen Tonti , ADHD coach and influencer, public speaker, and writer and producer for film and television

The one thing pretty much all of my one-to-one teachers have had, be it brass or composition, is the ability to go at the pace of the person they’re working with. I think that is really the key thing more than anything else. . . .

That’s the real trick and difficulty, I think, of teaching, generally, is to go at the pace that, when your student’s going well, you need to then match them and not slow them down, but at the same time, you don’t want to always be demanding that they do things quickly, because sometimes they need just a smidgen more time just to make sense of it, and then can go on and do.

—Ben Lunn, composer, conductor, and founder of the Disabled Artist Network

CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCING ACCESSIBLE ARTS EDUCATION

My work in accessible arts education began in the mid-1990s in my earliest days and years as an educator, when I was a new college faculty member teaching music theory and sight singing courses at a prestigious music conservatory where I had also been a student. I was enraptured with teaching, and I was fascinated by learning. My students intrigued and captivated me. I strived to get to know each of them as individuals, in my class, in the hallways, and on the streets of our urban campus. I sought to understand how each person learns and thinks so I could promote and facilitate their growth. Unbeknownst to me then, I was already engaging accessible arts education principles, habits of mind, and practices—I just didn’t have the context or the vocabulary to conceive of my teaching in terms of accessible arts education. That context and vocabulary had not yet emerged in the fields of education, special education, and arts education.

Back then, I taught several sections of a four-course sequence of extremely rigorous, required sight singing and music theory courses. Every student in the institution took all four courses, and many of the students struggled. Each semester, a few dozen students failed the courses and were required to retake them the following semester. To accommodate those students, the department created special

sections of the courses, known as the remedial sections, just for the students who failed the courses the first time around.

In collegiate music programs, sight singing and music theory courses often function as “gatekeeping” courses: Passing those courses is a prerequisite for other coursework and, therefore, for making progress toward the degree. The courses also hold particular significance when it comes to students’ identities. By the time a student enrolls as a music performance major at the college level, they have experienced success as a musician and are likely to think of themselves as a musician. For a number of these students, their struggles in the sight singing and music theory course sequence challenge their confidence, their sense of who they are, and their thoughts about their careers. The stakes of these courses, then, are quite high in more than one way.

In my first semester on the faculty, I was assigned to teach the remedial sections of all four courses. I discovered they were my favorite classes to teach. As I got to know my students, I delved deeply into each person’s thinking and learning to uncover where the issues might lie. Where were the disconnects in their understanding? Where were the gaps in their skills? How could I bridge the disconnects and gaps in ways that would make sense to them? What kinds of support did they need from me so that they could achieve and succeed?

Teaching the remedial sections was invigorating for me. I was jazzed about the work every day. I couldn’t wait to find and address the issues and obstacles that my students were experiencing and to witness their growth and the accomplishments that would follow. And I saw positive results: Over the years, all of my students ended up doing very well in my class, and all of them successfully resumed the sequence of required courses the following semester.

At the same time, my students became more confident. Having begun our class feeling embarrassed and defeated because they had failed the course the previous semester, these young musicians needed something more than a second time through the course material. They needed to see themselves as capable,

Introducing Accessible Arts Education

knowledgeable, talented, and worthy of a conservatory education— perhaps again, perhaps for the very first time. I considered this an important part of my responsibility to my students: not just to help them learn and grow in terms of their knowledge and skills but also to help them rebuild their injured confidence in themselves as students and as musicians.

I could fill an entire book of these students’ stories, but for the purpose of this chapter, I will share one representative example.

A young man studying African percussion was struggling with sight singing. It was clear from his participation in class that he understood the music theory concepts and knew what he wanted to sing, but something obstructed his ability to produce the actual sounds with his voice. The student thought there might be a physical issue at play, and he came to my office hours with questions about vocal technique. First, I asked him to sing a familiar song; I wanted to see what would happen when he tried to sing. The student sang a short folk song clearly and accurately. This signaled to me that his challenges with sight singing were not related to the physical aspects of vocal production; rather, there was some other obstacle to his ability to sight-sing correctly.

Next, I asked the student to try some pitch matching exercises. I played a note on the piano and asked him to sing the same note. I tried this several times, with different notes, and the result was the same: The student sang an incorrect note, and he was unable to find the correct note and sing it. As we discussed what it was like for him to try to match the pitches on the piano with his voice, I learned that he had never matched a pitch with his voice before. All of his prior musical experience had been with instrumental music in a non-Western culture. He didn’t know how to go about vocal pitch matching.

It seemed that pitch matching was the source of at least some of the student’s difficulties with sight singing. In that session, and over the next several weeks, we isolated the skill of pitch matching and pulled it apart from several angles. We strengthened his internal musical ear with ear-training exercises so he could hear pitches

in his head before singing them (what is commonly referred to as audiation in music education circles). We worked on instrumental pitch matching first, where he would use an instrument to play the same pitch I played on another instrument. Then we turned to vocal pitch matching in different contexts—using his voice to match the pitch from an instrument, from a recording, and from my singing voice—and we developed a series of strategies for him to use. We talked about the sensations related to vocal pitch matching: what it feels like when pitches match and when they do not. Over time, the student’s ability to match pitch improved to the point where he could do so easily, consistently, and correctly.

Gaining the skill of vocal pitch matching unlocked a dramatic improvement in the student’s sight singing skills, and he could use his voice more reliably to represent his understanding of music theory by singing the pitches he wanted to sing. By the end of the semester, he was able to pass my class and rejoin the sight singing and music theory course sequence.

I didn’t know it at the time, but as I was teaching the remedial sections, I was actually engaging in some key practices of accessible arts education, such as the following.

• Striving to understand my students’ thinking

• Seeking barriers that might be interrupting or diminishing students’ learning and growth

• Devising strategies and approaches to reduce or remove the barriers and promote student success

• Celebrating my students’ progress and highlighting what they could do with an asset-based attitude, rather than focusing on issues and challenges through a deficit-based lens

Back then, there was no such thing as accessible arts education—it did not yet exist. Today, accessible arts education is a generative educational framework that educators who teach students of all ages, in all subject areas, and in all educational settings can study and implement.

In the Artist’s Words

I took some classes previously in a college setting that involved dance and they were not quite as welcoming to figuring out a way to teach me, because I stay in the front of the class, and that’s how I am able to make out some of the teacher’s movements. And you also have to communicate with them, “Hey, I need you to be as verbal as possible and you might have to give me some corrections because there’s a good chance that I’ll interpret something wrong.” And there’s just been experiences in the past where I was put in a corner and had to do the exact same moves for like half a semester because the teacher just didn’t know what to do with me. But here at my university, we have two excellent professors in dance right now, they both have been wonderful with finding different ways to teach me, because it is different and because it has been different my entire life, I’m honestly behind and so, they’ve been really wonderful of communicating and asking, “Hey! Is this OK if we try things this way for a while or try to problem-solve one way or another?” (Everett, 2023)

Grace Tussing Douglas , blind musical theater actress and sound designer

This chapter explains what accessible arts education is and introduces readers to its key principles and habits of mind. It also features some of accessible arts education’s signature pedagogical strategies. I explore many more strategies in subsequent chapters.

Accessible Arts Education Defined

Accessible arts education is a dynamic set of principles, habits of mind, and pedagogical strategies that help educators strive to reach every student, regardless of their strengths, challenges, needs for support, or learning schemes. It is an educational framework for creating and facilitating classes, lessons, and studios that support the learning and growth of every student. Through the synthesis

and transformation of the evidence-based practices and resources of arts education, special education, and general education, this approach seeks to break down the silos between disciplines so that educators can reduce and remove barriers that interfere with student engagement, participation, and learning. The resultant educational framework is not fixed; rather, it is a generative approach that educators can use to cultivate the inclusiveness and accessibility of their teaching.

Arts educators receive very little preservice training or in-service support in how to teach students who learn differently, even as they face more and more student diversity in many ways, including how their students learn best (Bernard, 2023; Hourigan, 2007). These conditions have led arts educators, first informally and then more systematically, to develop both the field and the educational framework of accessible arts education with the hope of providing arts educators with tools to reach every student. Let’s take a look at the history and development of accessible arts education through three frames: (1) legislation, (2) organizations, and (3) individuals.

The legislative roots of accessible arts education date back to 1963, when President John F. Kennedy signed the Maternal and Child Health and Mental Retardation Planning Amendments to the Social Security Act (John F. Kennedy Presidential Library and Museum, n.d.), which provided funding for research about—as well as treatment, support, and education for—individuals with intellectual disabilities. The 1970s was a pivotal decade of legislative activity related to people with disabilities and accessibility. The Rehabilitation Act of 1973 prohibits organizations that receive federal funding, including schools, from discriminating on the basis of disability (U.S. Department of Labor, n.d.). The Rehab Act, as it is known, includes Section 504, which requires that federally funded schools provide a free appropriate public education (FAPE) to all disabled students in the school district (U.S. Department of Education, n.d.). The Education for All Handicapped Children Act, passed in 1975 and renamed in 1990 to the Individuals With Disabilities Education Act, supports states in meeting the needs of people with disabilities in educational settings through the

Introducing Accessible Arts Education

Individualized Education Program (IEP) process of evaluation, accommodations, and special education services (U.S. Department of Education, 2024). The Rehabilitation Act of 1973 and the Individuals With Disabilities Education Act (2004) remain the most significant pieces of legislation relating to accessibility for—and nondiscrimination toward—students with disabilities in U.S. schools.

The history of organizations whose work is related to arts education for people with disabilities also begins with a connection to the Kennedy family. In 1974, ambassador Jean Kennedy Smith created VSA (originally known as Very Special Arts and currently named Access/VSA International Network), an international organization focused on arts, education, and disability that is based at the Kennedy Center (Kennedy Center, n.d.). In the 1990s, VSA led the way in the formal development of accessible arts education by offering the Intersections conference, publishing resources, and presenting professional development workshops (Kennedy Center, n.d.). Soon thereafter, established national arts organizations developed special interest groups dedicated to arts education for people with disabilities as a means of support and networking for educators (American Alliance for Theatre & Education, n.d.; Fehr, 2015; National Art Education Association, 2024). This laid the groundwork for the creation of new organizations in the field of accessible arts education, such as the 2007 launch of the Berklee Institute for Accessible Arts Education, which I founded and direct. The Berklee Institute for Accessible Arts Education provides arts education programs for people with disabilities, graduate programs, and professional development offerings (Berklee College of Music, n.d.).

The following are some of the scholars and practitioners who were influential in the development of accessible arts education in the 1990s and early 2000s.

• Mary Adamek (Iowa School of Music, n.d.)

• Alice Hammel (Dr. Alice Hammel, n.d.)

• Alice-Ann Darrow (Florida State University School of Music, n.d.)

• Juliann Dorff (Kent State University, 2022)

• Lynne Horoschak (Moore College of Art and Design, 2019)

• Judith Jellison (Butler School of Music, n.d.)

• Beverley H. Johns (BevJohns, n.d.)

• Elise Sobol (NYU Steinhardt, n.d.)

• Janet Whitman Knighten (Division of Visual and Performing Arts Education, 2023)

Their early publications and leadership form the foundation of the field. In the ensuing years, numerous others—including myself— have proudly joined their ranks, striving to advance research and practice and nurture the community.

Accessible arts education, both as a field and as an educational framework, is on the rise. Since the early 2000s, we have seen an increasing number of conferences, conventions, publications, courses, and workshops being provided by an expanding cadre of organizations, scholars, and practitioners. Educators all over the world are creating strategies and documenting and sharing them with each other. Since the 2010s, these approaches have extended beyond the arts into other subject areas. Educators in non-arts disciplines have taken notice of these practical strategies to reach every student and have begun to incorporate them into their teaching settings, as well.

It is a very exciting time. And it is the ideal time for this book: the first text to lay out a framework for accessible arts education and provide strategies that every educator can employ with every student in every setting and in every discipline.

Principles of Accessible Arts Education

Three core principles undergird accessible arts education and guide the work of educators in the classroom and researchers in the field. Together, they provide a philosophical grounding for accessible arts education. They also articulate just a few of the ways accessible arts education is expansive: in terms of student population, subject area, and position in the educational process.

Principle 1: Necessary for Some and Helpful for All

Accessible arts education is for every student—not just for students with disabilities or diagnoses. Its principles, habits of mind, and pedagogical strategies benefit all students. Students need not have a formal diagnosis or a documented disability to benefit from strategies that increase the accessibility of teaching and learning. Educators need not have access to IEP documents about their students for accessible arts education to make a meaningful difference in their teaching.

Rather, accessible arts education is necessary for some students and helpful for all students, to employ a phrase that is often used by the special education community (Bernard, 2023). To elaborate, the strategies and approaches of accessible arts education are “necessary for those students who otherwise would not be able to access the curriculum and the activities. At the same time, they are helpful for all students because they increase that access for everyone” (Bernard, 2023, p. 6).

Many educators who have incorporated accessible arts education into their teaching practice have told me that doing so has had a profoundly positive impact on the effectiveness of their teaching with all their students.

Principle 2: Broadly Applicable, Within and Beyond the Arts

The pedagogical strategies of accessible arts education can be engaged everywhere that teaching and learning occur—within and beyond the arts. Although it originated in the arts, accessible arts education applies to all subject areas, all student populations, all age ranges, and all teaching and learning contexts. While this book is written from the arts education perspective, every strategy and example herein can easily be incorporated into any educational context and any subject area, either as is or with just a few simple tweaks. As a further guide for educators in other subject areas, examples throughout the book will feature applications of accessible arts education approaches to non-arts settings.

Principle 3: Accessible From the Outset

Accessible arts education is a critical and core component of the entire educational process, from planning to teaching, to assessing. It is not an add-on—it is not accommodations that are an afterthought, executed once the lesson has already been planned. When teachers begin by attending to accessibility, they can make a meaningful difference right away—first by anticipating barriers to student engagement, participation, and learning and then by striving to reduce and remove those barriers from the very start. This sets up the educational experience to be more accessible for everyone, leading to fewer surprises or issues that would require adjustments along the way.

On a recent Thursday afternoon, one of my undergraduate students, whom I’ll call Louisa, bounded into the classroom, slammed her notebook on her desk, and exclaimed, “I don’t get it!” When I asked her what she meant, Louisa replied, “Why is it that, in my other classes, we write out lesson plans, and then we add the accessibility section at the end? Shouldn’t we plan our lessons to make them accessible from the very beginning?”

Habits of Mind

Accessible arts education challenges educators to engage new ways of thinking about the educational enterprise. It promotes broader conceptions of learning, student engagement, and teaching. The following three habits of mind and their accompanying questions demonstrate the expansiveness of this approach when it comes to what learning, student engagement, and teaching look like.

Habit of Mind 1: Cultivate a Broad Conception of Learning

Every person learns in their own way, regardless of whether they have a disability or a diagnosis. The wide variability in how people learn is at the core of accessible arts education. Its principles challenge educators to expand their conception of what learning

Introducing Accessible Arts Education

looks like so they can facilitate and discover their students’ learning in as many ways as possible. Cultivating a broad conception of learning compels educators to ask, “In what ways is learning taking place?”

Accessible arts education requires teachers to abandon their assumptions of what learning looks like and recognize that learning might be happening in ways that lie beyond the conventional—beyond how they themselves and their students may have learned over the years. That recognition propels teachers to become investigators and instigators of their students’ learning, actively seeking to uncover evidence of learning and create multiple, wide-ranging opportunities for their students to demonstrate what they have learned.

Cultivating a broad conception of learning compels educators to ask, “In what ways is learning taking place?”

Several years ago, one of my faculty colleagues reached out to me. She told me about a student in one of her ear-training classes who happened to be on the autism spectrum. This student, according to my colleague, was in serious danger of failing the class because he had not been able to pass a single ear-training test. She went on to say that the student “obviously was not studying,” and she didn’t know what to do to help him.

In her account, my colleague made a couple of assumptions based on the student’s performance: that he had not learned what he needed to learn in the class, and he was not studying.

I can understand why she made these assumptions. They are rooted in a more traditional way of thinking about learning, as I discussed in the introduction (page 1): that learning and assessment take place through a unidimensional pedagogical process. When a pedagogical process is unidimensional, only those students who learn effectively and can demonstrate what they have learned and are able to do effectively through that particular process are successful. Other students—who may very well have learned and grown—are not able to succeed.

Accessible arts education interrupts the train of thought that leads to these sorts of assumptions. By cultivating a broad conception of learning and asking, “In what ways is learning taking place?” educators can approach situations like the one my colleague described as opportunities to investigate the particular student’s learning, reveal possible barriers to that learning, and discover ways to reduce or remove those barriers.

As the conversation with my colleague continued, the question “In what ways is learning taking place?” was at the forefront of my mind. To delve into this more, I asked my colleague a question, even though I already knew the answer: “How do you give your ear-training tests?” (I have taken and given dozens of ear-training tests, and they have always taken the same form: The teacher plays a musical excerpt on an instrument, and the student writes what they hear using musical notation.) And that was my colleague’s answer. She said, “I play something on the piano, and the students write it down.”

I started to wonder whether the use of pencil and paper in the ear-training tests might be a barrier for this student and his learning. Perhaps he possessed the knowledge but was not able to communicate it by writing it down. To investigate this hunch, and to try to get a better sense of the student’s learning, I asked my colleague to try an experiment with the student in a one-to-one office hours session. I suggested that she create manipulatives for the student to use (rather than pencil and paper) by drawing a large grand staff on a big piece of construction paper, printing out musical notes of various values, and cutting up the paper so that each musical note was on its own little piece of paper. Then, I suggested that she play some examples for the student in her office and task the student with arranging the little pieces of paper with the notes on them on the construction-paper staff to communicate what he heard her play.

She called me right after the office hours session to report that the student had gotten every example correct when he used the manipulatives!

Introducing Accessible Arts Education

This experiment confirmed that the student was, in fact, learning, and he had developed his ear-training skills. He could hear and understand the music very well. The pencil-and-paper aspects of the ear-training tests functioned as a barrier that prevented him from showing what he knew. With this newfound knowledge about her student and his learning, my colleague allowed the student to use manipulatives during his ear-training tests for the remainder of the semester. She also collaborated with our Accessibility Resources for Students office to ensure that he received support from an occupational therapist to help him with pencil-and-paper tasks.

Habit of Mind 2: Cultivate a Broad Conception of Student Engagement

Traditionally, in Western cultures, student engagement has been narrowly conceived. Specifically, teachers consider students to be engaged when they are sitting still, refraining from speaking or making any other sounds, and looking at the teacher. We now know that students, regardless of whether they have a disability or a diagnosis, actually engage in a much wider range of ways. As just a couple of examples, some people more effectively pay attention when they look to the side or close their eyes, limiting their visual sensory input; others find that standing and moving their bodies help them be more involved in learning activities. Accessible arts education challenges educators to expand their conception of what student engagement looks like so they can facilitate and spark their students’ engagement in as many ways as possible.

Cultivating a broad conception of student engagement compels educators to ask, “What can student engagement look like?”

Several years ago, on the first day of classes, one of my freshman students approached me to discuss the way that she engages best. She told me that she does her best learning when she is doodling: “To look at me, you’d think I’m not paying attention. I’m looking at

my paper and the doodles. But, actually, I’m hearing everything. I’m more involved in what’s going on in class if I doodle.” I gave her permission to doodle during class, and this student was consistently one of the most engaged and motivated students in the group. She regularly contributed to discussions, and she participated fully in every activity—doodling all the while.

Habit of Mind 3: Cultivate a Broad Conception of Teaching

As you read in the introduction (page 1), the wide variability in how people learn demands that educators provide information, facilitate experiences and activities, give feedback, ask questions, and more—that is, teach—in as many ways as possible. Accessible arts education challenges educators to expand their conception of what teaching looks like so they can reach every student, no matter how they learn best. Cultivating a broad conception of teaching compels educators to ask, “What can teaching look like?”

Rather than merely teaching the way they were taught, educators who engage the habits of mind of accessible arts education investigate, explore, create, and improvise as they teach, always seeking to connect with their students and the widely diverse ways in which they learn.

Cultivating a broad conception of teaching compels educators to ask, “What can teaching look like?”

Jane Sapp provides one of the most powerful descriptions of teaching I have ever heard. A music educator in the Springfield, Massachusetts, public schools, Sapp is the subject of the 2002 documentary Someone Sang for Me: A Portrait of Educator Jane Sapp by Julie Akeret. In the film, Sapp uses the metaphor of a treasure hunt to describe her approach to teaching:

What you’re trying to do is dig. It’s like a treasure. It’s like going on a treasure hunt. So the map says maybe it’s here. So you dig there. It’s not there. But you’re determined to find that

Introducing Accessible Arts Education treasure, right? So you say, “Well, I’m going to go over here. I’m going to dig here.” And I said, “Well, maybe I should change the tools. Maybe instead of a shovel, I should use a pick.” And so now I use this and see if I can find the treasure. Well, that’s how we have to see these kids. They are treasures. They are treasures. . . . We, as adults, our role is to find the treasure and then hold it up for them and let them see.

Accessible arts education does not seek to standardize students so they all learn in the same way, nor does it aim to standardize the process of teaching so educators teach using a single pedagogical approach. Rather, finding the treasures—acknowledging, knowing, seeing, validating, and celebrating the uniqueness of each student and how they learn—and using whatever methods it takes to reach them are the goals of accessible arts education practice.

Accessible Arts Education Strategies

Educational experiences are more accessible for all students when there are fewer barriers that interrupt or impede those experiences. Accessible arts education strategies center on anticipating and minimizing barriers to student engagement, participation, and learning. The first step to making educational experiences more accessible to all students takes place during the planning process.

Step 1: Anticipate Barriers by Identifying Them at the Outset

The first step of accessible arts education practice takes place when educators begin designing lessons, activities, assignments, and assessments. As the planning process gets underway, teachers identify any barriers that could interrupt or inhibit student engagement, participation, or learning. A teacher must first know what the barriers are (or could be) to engage accessible arts education strategies to reduce or remove the barriers. Barriers can exist in all aspects of teaching and learning, including the following.

• How teachers engage students: For example, activating prior knowledge can be a barrier if a student does not possess that prior knowledge. Speaking about the work of a particular artist or referring to a book can be a barrier if a student is not familiar with the artist’s work or has not read the book.

• How teachers provide information for students: For example, communicating information and giving instructions by speaking them can be barriers if a student needs additional time to process auditory information.

• How teachers require students to participate in activities and assignments: For example, a group activity can be a barrier if a student is not comfortable interacting with their peers. Requiring students to write an essay can be a barrier if it is difficult for a student to put their thoughts into writing.

• How teachers assess student learning: For example, using playing, singing, dancing, or drawing as an assessment can be a barrier if a student’s understanding is greater than their ability to demonstrate or perform. Assessing student learning in mathematics class based on how quickly a student can complete a worksheet with multiplication problems can be a barrier if a student needs more time to process written language and numbers.

• How teachers define progress: For example, equating progress with steady improvement in skills every week can be a barrier for a student whose perfectionism or anxiety inhibits their ability to execute new skills. In these situations, it might appear at first glance that the student is not making progress when, in fact, they are—it’s just that the progress cannot be seen in their execution of the skill. They might have made progress in relation to other aspects of the skill, such as their ability to explain it or detect errors when others perform the skill.

Figure 1.1 shows how a teacher might identify potential barriers to student learning.

Introducing Accessible Arts Education

Once educators have identified possible barriers that might emerge, they can try to minimize them as they plan lessons, activities, assignments, and assessments. Figure 1.2 (page 34) shows one way teachers could plan strategies to reduce barriers they’ve identified during their planning process.

Aspect of Pedagogy Planned Strategy Possible Barriers

Engage Students

Provide Information for Students

Provide student choice through a class vote.

Distribute handouts with terms and definitions.

The class vote will not be every student’s first choice, and some students will be unhappy with the result.

Some students require additional time to process written information. Some students understand symbols more easily than words. Some students find it challenging when there is a large amount of text on a page.

Require Students to Participate

Assign students to work in pairs.

Assess Student Learning

Define Progress

Use a pencil-andpaper task to gauge student learning.

Require that students reach particular levels of skill proficiency at midyear and at the end of the year.

Some students have difficulties interacting with peers and collaborating on assignments because they don’t know what to say or how to go about the work.

Some students have difficulties with the physical act of writing. Some students find it challenging to put their thoughts on paper.

Some students may make progress but may not be able to demonstrate it through their skill level.

FIGURE 1.1: Identifying potential barriers.

Examples of Teaching Strategies to Reduce or Remove the Barrier

What It Interrupts or Inhibits

Barrier Whom It Could Affect

Introduce the whole class to the artist’s work or the book.

Student engagement

Student who is unfamiliar with the artist or the book

Reference to an artist’s work or to a book

Engage visual tools for communicating information or instructions. Use text, symbols, and pictures.

Student engagement, participation, and learning

Student who needs additional processing time for auditory input

Spoken information or instructions

Structure the group activities by assigning each student a role, providing the groups with a sequential checklist for their work, and sharing scripts (sentence starters and specific suggestions of things to say in the group).

Allow students to complete the activities either individually or in pairs, for those who wish to do so.

Student participation and learning

Student who is not comfortable with peer interactions

Group activities

Engage text-to-speech tools for students who prefer to speak their thoughts. Use graphic organizers to help students think through their ideas and how they are related. Divide the class into pairs who collaborate on the essay and support each other.

Student participation and learning

Student who has difficulty putting thoughts into writing

Essay writing

Provide additional choices for students as to what they can produce for the assignment, including videos, PowerPoint presentations, artistic creations, and so on, with clear guidelines for the required elements of the assignment and a rubric for how it will be assessed.

Assess through additional means, such as by asking students to detect errors in a performance, teach another student the important concepts or elements of the skill, and explain what they know in a presentation or video.

Student participation and learning

Student whose understanding is greater than their ability to perform

Assessment through demonstration or arts-based performance

Allow students to complete the tasks without being timed. Isolate certain portions of the tasks for the students to complete while being timed, and rehearse those tasks with the students to prepare them.

Student participation and learning

Student who needs additional processing time

Assessment based on timed tasks

First, abandon this definition of progress. Progress looks different for every learner, and expecting steady improvement every week is unrealistic and unfair. Seek other ways to determine whether students’ skills have improved. Ask students to perform the skills in a different modality (to clap instead of play or to move their hands instead of their whole bodies, for example).

Student learning

Student whose perfectionism or anxiety inhibits their ability to execute new skills

Progress that’s defined as steady skill improvement every week

FIGURE 1.2: Examining barriers and planning strategies to reduce or remove them.

Visit go.SolutionTree.com/differentiatedinstruction for a free reproducible version of this figure.

Identifying and anticipating barriers at the outset of the planning process sets the stage for teachers to strive to reduce or remove barriers. That takes us to the next step.

Step 2: Strive to Remove Barriers

After identifying potential barriers to student engagement, participation, and learning, the next step is to strive to reduce or remove them. There are many strategies that educators can employ to minimize barriers and thereby maximize the accessibility of the educational experiences they facilitate. In this section, I discuss five of the most broadly applicable and effective pedagogical strategies in accessible arts education. We’ll explore more strategies in subsequent chapters.

I often refer to the following five strategies as high-percentage teaching strategies . My use of this phrase stems from a basketball metaphor. In professional and collegiate basketball, statisticians track many aspects of the game, including something called high-percentage shots , or shots that, statistically, for a given player, have a high likelihood of going into the basket and therefore being successful. Statisticians track and analyze the relationship between two elements: (1) the player’s physical location on the basketball court when they release the ball for the shot and (2) the percentage of the player’s shots from that location that go into the basket. For just two examples, some players shoot free throws really well, and those would be high-percentage shots for them; likewise, players with high-percentage shots from the three-point range have great success from behind the three-point line. Coaches use statistics regarding various players and their high-percentage shots to craft plays and forge defensive strategies.

Just as high-percentage shots in basketball have a high likelihood of landing in the basket, high-percentage teaching strategies have a high likelihood of making educational experiences accessible for every student. Educators who incorporate high-percentage teaching strategies into their practice open up myriad pathways for learning

Introducing Accessible Arts Education

for all of their students; the strategies are extremely effective at reducing and removing barriers and, therefore, increase the accessibility of educational experiences for every student.

SPOTLIGHT: DIFFERENTIATED INSTRUCTION

Differentiated instruction is an educational approach that emphasizes tailoring instruction for individual students. It is said that the basic ideas behind differentiated instruction date back to the earliest days of schooling in the United States, where many students at different levels were educated in the same room (Tomlinson, 2014). Since her highly influential 1995 text, How to Differentiate Instruction in Mixed-Ability Classrooms, educator Carol Ann Tomlinson has led the way in research and practice when it comes to differentiated instruction. She has published numerous books and articles that develop the concept further and provide educators with practical resources and procedures. According to Tomlinson (2014, 2017), effective differentiation takes place when educators alter and adjust one or more of the following three elements.

1. Content: What they learn (knowledge and skills)

2. Process: How they learn (activities)

3. Products: How they demonstrate their learning (assessments)

The understanding that all people learn differently—often referred to as learner variability (Pape, 2018)—undergirds differentiated instruction. Educators who attend to that variability and customize their instruction for it are more likely to create the conditions for effective learning on the part of every student.

STRATEGY 1: SEPARATE THE GOAL FROM THE MEANS

One very effective strategy that educators can engage to eliminate potential barriers is to prioritize their goals for their students without demanding a particular means for reaching those goals.

When the means is embedded within the goal, our teaching becomes less accessible because the means can act as a barrier for some students. When we disentangle the goal and the means, the means becomes flexible and the barrier is reduced. Educator and noted UDL presenter and author Liz Byron uses the phrase “clear goal with flexible means” in a 2019 podcast episode with Tim Bogatz to encourage teachers to engage this strategy. Carol Ann Tomlinson (2014, 2017) refers to this strategy as “creating multiple paths for learning” in a 1997 video.

Two of the previous examples involve goals with the means embedded within them (see figure 1.3).

Goal

With Means Embedded Means or Potential Barrier Goal With Flexible Means

Learn a concept through a group activity.

Demonstrate understanding of content by writing an essay.

Group activity

Learn a concept.

Essay writing

Demonstrate understanding of content.

FIGURE 1.3: Separating the goal from the means.

Visit go.SolutionTree.com/differentiatedinstruction for a free reproducible version of this figure.

When we separate the goal from the means, we open many possibilities for students rather than limiting them to a particular pathway to reach the goal.

For example, consider one end-of-semester goal for my freshman students: “By the end of this course, students will be able to demonstrate their understanding of and reflection on the concept of neurodiversity.” This goal does not have the means embedded within it. In practice, the students employ a wide range of means to achieve this goal. They might:

• Write journals and analyze how their thinking has changed over the course of the semester

• Conduct research into particular aspects of neurodiversity

• Interview neurodivergent individuals whom they know

• Write traditional essays

• Create works of visual art and present them

• Write songs and perform them

• Produce videos and show them

• Craft poetry or theater pieces and read them aloud

Regardless of the means, the overwhelming majority of the students meet the goal. As an educator, it is really exciting for me to see the variety of my students’ journeys. I learn a great deal about my students, their thinking, and the concept of neurodiversity when they share their understandings and reflections.

By contrast, imagine that I stated my goal this way: “By the end of this course, students will be able to demonstrate their understanding of and reflection on the concept of neurodiversity by writing an eight-page paper and giving a formal presentation using a slideshow.” This goal has the means embedded within it, and each of the various components of the means—in this case, writing the paper, giving the presentation, and using a slideshow—could act as a barrier for a student.

At the end of the day, lesson, activity, unit, or semester, what matters most is that our students work toward and achieve the goals we have set for them. How exactly they do that is far less important. After all, as educators, we care most deeply about our students’ learning—we want them to gain new understandings, develop new skills, think more deeply and critically, and much more. We want them to get there. Mandating a particular pathway can result in a barrier that might prevent students from making the full journey and might make it impossible for them to reach the goal.

SPOTLIGHT: UNIVERSAL DESIGN FOR LEARNING

UDL is an educational framework for expanding learning opportunities for all individuals. Inspired by the concept of universal design in architecture, which strives to ensure the accessibility of physical spaces, educational researchers David H. Rose and Anne Meyer developed UDL in 1984 with the founding of CAST (Center for Applied Special Technology; www.cast.org). The mission of CAST is to “bust the barriers to learning that millions of people experience daily” (Open Access, n.d.). Since the mid-1980s, thanks to rigorous, ongoing research, CAST has developed the UDL Guidelines, resources, publications, and trainings that have reached numerous educators around the world (Rose & Meyer, 2006).

The three core principles of UDL are intended to inform the entire educational enterprise—planning, teaching and learning, and assessment (CAST, 2024). Specifically, when engaging UDL, educators should:

1. Design multiple means of engagement

2. Design multiple means of representation

3. Design multiple means of action and expression

At its heart, UDL facilitates expansion and flexibility in educational settings. CAST argues that, by engaging the UDL framework, educators can increase the likelihood of meaningful learning for every student through the design and implementation of a wider range of practices in planning, pedagogy, and assessment (Gordon, 2024).

STRATEGY 2: RECRUIT STUDENT INTEREST IN MORE THAN ONE WAY

As educators, we want our students to be involved and motivated. We wish for them to be interested in, excited about, and ready for learning. Unfortunately, though, as I discussed earlier in this chapter, sometimes the way that a teacher goes

Introducing Accessible Arts Education

about getting students involved and motivated can act as a barrier for some students. To reduce or remove barriers to student engagement, educators should aim to recruit student interest in more than one way. CAST (Center for Applied Special Technology), in their guidelines for UDL, encourages teachers to “design multiple means of engagement” when they plan lessons and activities (CAST, 2024).

For example, a teacher might think a contest or competition would increase student interest and engagement, but it could end up creating a barrier for some learners. An elementary language arts teacher might create a series of scavenger hunt activities where students identify and correct grammatical errors, a middle school band director might hold an adjudicated solo performance festival, or a community arts teacher might engage judges for an art show. While these activities may help engage some students, they may act as barriers for individuals who become anxious in competitive environments, who hold themselves to perfectionistic standards, or who feel extremely uncomfortable when their work is publicly compared to that of their classmates.

Rather than utilizing only one approach to recruiting student interest, educators who recruit student interest in more than one way increase the accessibility of their teaching. Some other possible ways to recruit student interest include the following.

• Sharing the work of the artist and the book that the teacher wishes to reference so that every student is familiar with them: Essentially, the teacher provides the prior knowledge they wish to activate, lays out the context for what they are about to teach, and connects that context to the new material, concepts, or skills to ignite student interest and motivation. Letting all of the students in on the context that we wish to reference increases the accessibility of our teaching and helps boost student engagement and motivation.

• Demonstrating what the students will be able to do as a way to spark the “wow” factor: The teacher

can heighten student interest in and excitement about what they are about to learn through a high-quality demonstration. This demonstration could be executed by the teacher or through the use of recordings, visuals, or guest presentations. Showing students that they soon will know, experience, or be able to do something awesome—something that inspires a reaction of “Wow!”—drums up student engagement, helps motivate students, and increases the accessibility of what we are about to teach.

• Providing choice: Student ownership engages and motivates learners. Teachers can set parameters for students to make all sorts of decisions. For example, a band director could allow the students to select the final piece of repertoire for the upcoming concert by giving them three pieces to choose from, playing recordings of each one, and asking the class to vote on their favorite. A mathematics teacher could provide students with two possible homework assignments and ask them to complete one of them. Students in an English literature class could select one of four books to read and form a book club with the other students who chose the same text.

See the reproducible “Recruit Student Interest in More Than One Way” at the end of this chapter (page 51) for a tool educators can use to plan diverse ways to recruit student interest.

Recruiting student interest in more than one way increases accessibility by providing multiple entry points for students to engage with materials and activities, which makes embarking on the educational journey a real possibility for everyone.

STRATEGY 3: COMMUNICATE IN MORE THAN ONE WAY

As educators, we want to be sure our students understand information, instructions, and feedback. We want our students to take in, process, retain, and make meaning of what we communicate when we teach. Unfortunately, sometimes the way that teachers communicate can act as a barrier for some

students, making it difficult for them to learn. To lessen this barrier, educators should aim to communicate in more than one way. The UDL Guidelines call for teachers to “design multiple means of representation” as part of their planning (CAST, 2024).

Providing students with instructions and information by telling them what you want them to know might feel as though it is an efficient pedagogical strategy, but it will not be sufficient for all students. For example, a student who processes auditory information slowly or a student who experiences challenges with interpreting and understanding language may not understand what you are saying. This creates a barrier that interferes with the student’s learning and makes the educational experience less accessible.

Educators who communicate in more than one way increase the likelihood that students will understand them, thereby increasing the accessibility of their teaching. Some other possible ways to communicate include the following.

• Employing visual tools: Teachers can use visual tools as another way to communicate with their students. These may include words, pictures, symbols, discipline-specific notation, and more. Representing information visually can help more students gain access to the information and understand what is being communicated. I explore strategies for using visual tools, as well as the role of visual tools in accessible arts education pedagogy, in much greater depth in chapter 5 (page 143).

• Defining terms: Every subject area has its own vocabulary— its own language that is used to refer to elements and describe concepts or processes. Taking the time to define the terms they use can help educators communicate more effectively with their students. By doing so, teachers open more possibilities for student understanding, thus making the educational experience more accessible.

• Utilizing technology: Today’s students choose to communicate using technology, whether it be through

texting, using apps for polling or educational games, taking and posting photographs, creating videos, or video conferencing. Educators who employ technology as a medium for communicating with their students make their teaching more accessible by using tools with which students are familiar and comfortable. The medium of technology might be just what a certain student needs to understand the teacher’s message.

See the reproducible “Communicate in More Than One Way” at the end of this chapter (page 52) for a tool educators can use to plan diverse ways to communicate with students.

STRATEGY 4: ASSESS IN MORE THAN ONE WAY

Educators want to uncover meaningful evidence of student learning. We want to find ways for our students to show what they know and can do so their learning is seen and demonstrated. As I noted earlier, sometimes the assessments educators use cannot reveal all—or even some—of the learning that is taking place for a particular student. In these cases, the assessments become a barrier for the student because their learning is not visible through the window of the particular assessment. To lessen this barrier, educators should aim to assess in more than one way. When teachers “design multiple means of action and expression,” using the parlance of the UDL Guidelines, they plan for a range of assessments, increasing the visibility of student learning (CAST, 2024).

To revisit one of the barriers I already discussed, assessing students based on how well they can execute a skill or on a public performance might feel like a terrific form of authentic assessment, particularly in skill-based or arts-based settings. After all, if we are teaching someone how to draw, how to play an instrument, how to dance, how to compute the average of a group of numbers, or how to diagram sentences (for just a few examples), it seems to follow that asking the student to do those things would be an effective way to assess their learning. However, merely assessing what a student can do is not a sufficient way to determine whether and how much

Introducing Accessible Arts Education

a student has learned, even when that learning has to do with skill development. Sometimes, students have learned in other ways that they cannot yet demonstrate by executing skills or presenting a performance. For those students, the learning may be in their brains but not yet in their fingers, in their writing, or in their bodies. Employing one means of determining whether learning has taken place creates a barrier that interferes with student learning and diminishes the accessibility of the educational experience.

Teachers who assess in more than one way increase the likelihood that learning will be seen and demonstrated, thereby increasing the accessibility of their teaching. There are many possible ways to assess students. The following strategies offer a couple examples.

• Looking beyond pencil and paper: As we saw earlier in the case of the student and his ear-training tests, for some students, using pencil and paper can be a barrier to showing what they know and are able to do. They may have gained the knowledge and developed their skills but not be able to use pencil and paper to express what they know. Traditionally, many assessments include a penciland-paper component. Looking beyond pencil and paper requires educators to engage their creativity when it comes to assessing their students and to provide a range of opportunities and media by which students can show what they have learned. When the ear-training teacher took pencil and paper out of the assessment by utilizing manipulatives, she was able to see how much the student learned and was able to do when it came to ear training.

• Exploring beyond knowing equals doing : In the arts, as well as in many other subject areas, what a person knows is often bound up in what they can do . A person who can execute something well is generally considered to possess knowledge in that area. Educators often assess their students based on how well they perform a particular task, whether it be playing an instrument, dancing a choreography, solving mathematics problems, composing well-written essays, debating a topic convincingly, memorizing poetry,

or reciting the spelling of words correctly, for just a few examples. However, knowing something takes multiple forms and has to do with more than execution. Knowing can also include the ability to understand concepts, explain something clearly, and detect and correct errors in the performances of others. Assessing in more than one way compels educators to seek, recognize, and validate multiple ways of knowing to more fully understand their students’ learning.

When I was studying jazz voice performance, the level of my scat-singing performance was far below the level of my theoretical understanding. I had highly developed knowledge of music theory and the principles of jazz improvisation, but it was extremely difficult for me to translate that knowledge into successful scat singing. Thankfully, my teachers took full stock of what I knew about jazz improvisation and did not limit their assessments of my knowledge to how well I could scat-sing. It took many, many hours of practice, coupled with the guidance of my teachers, to get me to the point where I could perform vocal improvisations that reflected my understanding of the music.

Exploring beyond knowing equals doing requires educators to seek evidence for multiple dimensions of student learning, with the aim to ensure that learning is seen, demonstrated, and validated.

See the reproducible “Assess in More Than One Way” at the end of this chapter (page 53) for a tool educators can use to plan diverse ways to assess student work.

STRATEGY 5: UTILIZE TASK ANALYSES

Complex tasks can be a barrier for some students. The students might become overwhelmed by what is being asked of them. They might not know where to start—or, after they have begun, they might not have a clear understanding of how to proceed. An evidence-based strategy from special education known as a task analysis can be a very effective way to address this barrier (McConomy, Root, & Wade, 2022; Means, 1993).

Introducing Accessible Arts Education

A task analysis is a sequential list of the substeps of a complex task broken down into subtasks. As a result, (a) the task becomes more manageable because students can focus on and complete each individual, doable subtask, (b) the sequence of steps provides students with a process for completing the task, and (c) students have the opportunity to review and understand the entire sequence of steps at any point in the process.

The most effective task analyses break down the task into very small steps, with each step involving only one element. Multiple elements in a single step of a task analysis could be overwhelming for some students. Thinking about this another way, it is far more effective for a task analysis to contain more (rather than fewer) steps. Including too many steps in a task analysis does not present difficulties or barriers for students, but including too few steps could. When in doubt, add steps to the task analysis.

Task analyses are usually presented as lists. They can be represented in words, in words and symbols or pictures, or just in pictures, depending on the particular student, task, and setting. Consider the following sample task analysis for students to follow to clean up after they use watercolors in an art class.

1. Put your paintbrush into your water cup.

2. Use a paper towel to mop up any loose paint on your watercolor kit.

3. Close the cover of your watercolor kit.

4. Put your watercolor kit on the shelf where it is kept in the classroom.

5. Bring your paintbrush to the sink.

6. Turn on the cold water in the sink.

7. Clean your paintbrush by running it under cold water for thirty seconds.

8. Turn off the cold water in the sink.

9. Use a paper towel to blot extra water from your paintbrush.

10. Put your paintbrush into the canister where it is kept in the classroom.

11. Bring your water cup to the sink.

12. Pour the water in your water cup down the drain.

13. Run the cold water in the sink for thirty seconds.

14. Throw away your water cup.

15. Throw away your paper towels.

16. Bring your watercolor painting to the drying-station tables.

17. Leave your watercolor painting on an empty spot on one of the drying-station tables.

18. Return to your seat.

See the reproducible “Create a Task Analysis” at the end of this chapter (page 54) for a tool educators can use to create task analyses.

SPOTLIGHT: TASK ANALYSIS

Task analysis was first developed and articulated by special education researchers in the 1970s (Gold, 1976; Moyer & Dardig, 1978). In the years since, it has been embraced by special educators and behavioral therapists, who use it to promote individuals’ skill development and to nurture their independence (Sam & Autism Focused Intervention Resources and Modules, 2016a). Task analyses can be effectively utilized in a wide range of contexts, beyond academic skills—from teaching daily living skills (hand washing, teeth brushing) to household skills (cleaning, cooking), to communication skills (active listening, providing appropriate responses; Pratt & Steward, 2020; SkyCare ABA, n.d.).

Teachers and students most often use task analyses in one of two ways (McConomy et al., 2022; Pratt & Steward, 2020).

1. Forward chaining: Starting with the very first step and ensuring that each step is mastered before moving on to the next step in the sequence

2. Backward chaining: Starting with the very last step and ensuring that each step is mastered before moving on to the previous step in the sequence

Introducing Accessible Arts Education

Task analyses can also be utilized as part of what is commonly referred to as total task teaching, where the student attempts the entire complex task while the teacher takes note of the subtasks in the task analysis that require additional support as a way to focus their instruction (Pratt & Steward, 2020; Sam & Autism Focused Intervention Resources and Modules, 2016a).

While most of the time, teachers create the task analyses that their students will use, it is possible for the development of a task analysis to be a pedagogical tool. I have created task analyses along with students—particularly students who have effectively used task analyses that were prepared by others. Together, we talk about and analyze the task, and the student takes the lead in determining the steps and their sequence. In some cases, after having codesigned several task analyses with me, the students began to write their own task analyses independently, without my assistance.

Takeaways

As educators, we can have a powerful impact on people’s lives. It is one of the great rewards of our profession to facilitate students’ growth and development. Helping learners make progress every day and hearing from former students that their time with you influenced them in positive ways are sources of deep satisfaction for every educator.

We can increase our impact by increasing access. When students have greater access to engagement, participation, and learning, educators can have an even more significant impact on students’ lives. Accessible arts education provides frameworks, principles, habits of mind, and strategies that we can use to increase our impact on our students in at least two powerful ways.

1. We can change students’ educational lives. By opening learning opportunities and experiences to everyone, we make it possible for all students to enjoy the marvelous human endeavors of expanding thinking, developing skills,

and coming up with new ideas, solutions, processes, creative works, and more. In other words, accessible arts education provides us with tools we can use to promote and facilitate meaningful educational opportunities for every learner.

2. We can change students’ feelings about themselves. By providing multidimensional pedagogical approaches with a range of pathways to learning and various means of assessment, we create the conditions for all students to experience success and think of themselves as good students. Put another way, accessible arts education provides us with habits of mind and practices that can help us nurture student confidence.

I first engaged some of the principles, habits of mind, and pedagogical practices of accessible arts education by sheer instinct when I was teaching the remedial sections back in the mid-1990s. Today, accessible arts education is an established, dynamic, and generative framework that all educators can use to amplify their impact by increasing access.

In the Artist’s Words

I’m very realistic about the arts industry. . . . I’m not disregarding how important my art is, but I know that sometimes I will be included in an exhibition or public programming because you’ve got to check that you’ve included a disabled artist. . . . But you should know that if you do curate me into that exhibition, I’m gonna wedge open that door, and I’m gonna build a ramp and prioritize accessibility. And you know what? There will be so many disabled artists who will follow, and we will change the face of the art industry. It’s not gonna stop with me. I’m your Trojan horse!

(A. C. Mills, personal communication, September 25, 2024)

Amy Claire Mills , textile artist, curator, and producer

Recruit Student Interest in More Than One Way

Use the following table to brainstorm a range of ways to recruit student interest. The table includes three specific ways to recruit student interest, as well as space for you to add other ways not listed here.

How I Plan to Recruit Student Interest

Provide Background Knowledge or Experiences

Demonstrate for the “Wow” Factor

Provide Student Choice

Other

Communicate in More Than One Way

Use the following table to brainstorm a range of ways to communicate with students. The table includes three specific ways to communicate, as well as space for you to add other ways not listed here.

How I Plan to Communicate

Employ Visual Tools

Define Terms

Utilize Technology

Other

Accessible Arts Education © 2026 Solution Tree Press • SolutionTree.com Visit go.SolutionTree.com/differentiatedinstruction to download this free reproducible.

Assess in More Than One Way

Use the following table to brainstorm a range of ways to assess student work. The table includes three specific approaches to assessment, as well as space for you to add others, as well.

How I Plan to Assess Student Work

Look Beyond Pencil and Paper

Explore Beyond Knowing Equals Doing

Provide Student Choice

Other

Create a Task Analysis

Use the following table to help you design a task analysis. Start by listing the complex task that you intend to teach in the left-most column. Next, create a list of sequential steps for completing the task. Then, break the steps from the preceding column into smaller steps. Finally, in the right-most column, break the smaller steps from the preceding column into even smaller steps.

ACCESSIBLE ARTS EDUCATION

Arts education is for everyone. That means our teaching must evolve to meet the unique needs of disabled students in the arts. In Accessible Arts Education: Principles, Habits, and Strategies to Unleash Every Student’s Creativity and Learning, Rhoda Bernard offers educators a new way forward. With personal reflections and testimonies from disabled artists, Bernard introduces readers to the perspectives and realities of students living with disabilities. She provides simple, actionable strategies for teachers to proactively address learning barriers and create a truly welcoming and inclusive learning environment. Although this essential guide focuses on the arts, the principles, habits, and strategies within it apply to teachers and students in all disciplines. It’s time to unleash the creative and academic potential in every student.

Readers will:

• Foster disabled students’ agency through open dialogues about their strengths and learning needs

• Reduce student anxiety through a structured class environment and regularized routines

• Explore new teaching methods that stimulate different learning modalities for all students

• Incorporate useful visual cues, signals, and strategies to improve student learning

• Plan for instances of sensory overload and how best to respond and mitigate the effects

Principles, Habits, and Strategies to Unleash Every Student’s Creativity and Learning

“Bernard’s passion for learning resonates through this on-point presentation of accessible arts education. When difference is the given—the expected—there is a way in for every learner.”

Jessica Hoffmann Davis Bauman and Bryant Senior Lecturer in the Arts in Education (Retired), Harvard Graduate School of Education

“Bernard provides clear, systematic strategies for working with all students in arts education. This book is a gift to the arts education community and their students.”

Ann-Bailey Lipsett Special Education Consultant

“Students with disabilities often have highly developed skills in the arts but lack success because they can’t access instruction. Bernard offers educators powerful tools to provide access and help students overcome barriers in arts education.”

Cara Shores Solution Tree Author and Associate