Chapter 7: Research and Development As depicted in Figure 13, learners vary in their strengths and needs. The most frequently occurring mix of strength and needs (also known as “teaching to the middle”) is depicted leftmost, with less frequently occurring mixes spreading to the right. Rising upward, the figure depicts the number of learners who benefit from a particular learning design, pathway, or approach. We argue that AI can bring opportunities to address a wider spectrum of strengths and needs but only if developers and innovators focus on the long tail and not only “teaching to the middle.” For the sake of argument, the figure indicates three zones. In a first zone, curricular resources are mostly standardized, with perhaps a dimension or two of adaptivity. For example, many existing products adapt based on the correctness of student answers and may also provide options to read or hear text in a second language. However, the core of the instructional approach is highly standardized. In a second zone, there is greater balance between how much standardization and how much adaptivity students can access. Universal Design for Learning (UDL) is one set of recommendations for providing learning opportunities in multiple formats and for accommodating different learning progressions. UDL can enable accommodating more ways in which learners vary, and as teachers know, there are many more important ways to adapt to students than found in today’s edtech products. Students are neurodiverse. They bring different assets from their experiences at home, in their communities, and in their cultures. They have different interests and motivations. And they learn in varied settings—classrooms and schools differ, and at-home students learn in informal settings in ways that 76 | P a g e
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