Accessible learning experiences to create belonging in inclusive classrooms

Summary
While global education systems have made substantial progress in securing physical and technological access for learners with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND), achieving genuine belonging remains a vital, ongoing challenge. At Bett Asia 2026, educational leaders gathered to discuss how schools can move beyond compliance-driven access towards learning environments where every pupil feels validated, credible, and psychologically safe.

Chaired by Melanie Tagg of Futuresource Consulting, the panel featured strategic insights from Heikhal Hamzah (SEAMEO SEN) alongside practical, on-the-ground expertise from Paul Antcliffe (BSKL). The session established that building inclusive classrooms requires embedding Universal Design for Learning (UDL) from the outset, adopting a 'barrier-first' approach to artificial intelligence (AI), and re-evaluating how schools recognise student achievement.

Access versus Belonging: A Foundational Distinction
To transform inclusive practice, educators and policy makers must distinguish between providing access and cultivating belonging.

Access is typically defined by policy commitments, legislation, physical infrastructure, and funding metrics reported to education ministries. It ensures that students with SEND can enter a learning space and undertake tasks.

Belonging is an individual, emotional, and relational experience. It reflects how a child feels within their learning space—specifically whether they feel safe, respected, and capable of contributing meaningfully alongside their peers.

A central conclusion from the discussion is that access and belonging do not need to occur sequentially. Schools do not need to wait for structural access to be fully perfected before fostering belonging; both can—and should—be developed concurrently.

"To make a child feel a strong sense of belonging, you have to make them look and feel credible—like they have contributed something positive in front of their peers." — Paul Antcliffe, Deputy Headteacher, BSKL

Core Principles of Universal Design for Learning (UDL)
Universal Design for Learning (UDL) provides the framework necessary to translate inclusion from a theoretical commitment into daily classroom practice. Rather than designing instruction for an 'average' pupil and retrofitting accommodations for neurodiverse learners, UDL requires educators to plan for learner variability from the outset.

1. Designing for Diversity from the Start
Retrofitting learning activities after a student struggles creates unnecessary barriers and reinforces feelings of isolation. Designing flexible learning pathways from the beginning ensures that accessibility is inherent to the curriculum.

2. Building Capacity Through Everyday Structures
While external training workshops offer useful insights, sustainable teacher growth occurs through embedded, daily peer-learning structures within schools. Capacity is built when educators regularly share, adapt, and refine inclusive practices with colleagues.

3. Assistive Technology as an Enabler, Not the Strategy
Technology should never be treated as the overarching strategy for inclusion. Built-in accessibility features on day-to-day devices and specific assistive tools are most effective when integrated into a well-defined UDL framework and backed by confident teaching pedagogy.

Practical Application: Authentic Expression and Inclusive Competitions
A common hurdle for schools is ensuring that academic enrichment activities do not alienate SEND learners. At the British International School Kuala Lumpur, academic competitions are structured around allowing pupils to express meaning through multiple channels.

Using digital collaboration platforms such as Padlet, pupils are given autonomy over how they showcase their understanding:

Multimodal Submissions: Students can submit visual work, written text, audio recordings, or video notes.

Equal Parity of Outcomes: A spoken audio response is treated as being of equal merit and validity to a written report.

Reframing Success: Instead of celebrating only top-ranked winners, school leaders celebrate participation rates, effort, and individual progress.

By shifting the focus from high-attaining victory to personal growth, schools protect pupil self-esteem and build psychological safety—a crucial foundation for children with additional needs who may suffer from low confidence.

Artificial Intelligence in Inclusive Education: A Barrier-First Approach
As AI tools proliferate across schools, the panel highlighted key opportunities and guardrails for integrating AI within special educational needs provision.

Inclusive AI by Design
AI systems used in education must be inherently inclusive from their inception rather than retrofitted for disabled learners. Procuring or developing AI tools without considering diverse learning requirements risks creating new digital barriers.

Focus on Learning Reach Over Speed
Rather than using AI merely to accelerate administrative output or lesson planning speed, educators should harness predictive and generative AI to expand learning reach. AI can generate diverse, multimodal pathways to complex concepts, allowing neurodiverse students to access core learning content.

Diagnosing Barriers Before Selecting Tools
Schools should adopt a barrier-first, not technology-first mindset. Educators must first identify the precise learning barrier a child faces before selecting an AI tool to mitigate that challenge.

AI for Non-Judgmental Teacher Reflection
Beyond direct student instruction, AI presents significant value in professional development. At BSKL, teachers record lesson delivery and feed the video into AI models to receive objective, non-judgmental feedback on instructional methods. This removes the anxiety often associated with peer observations and encourages self-reflection.

Actionable Roadmap for Educational Leaders
To implement meaningful change within six weeks to six months, the panel recommended two immediate, practical initiatives for school leaders and classroom teachers:

Conduct a Small-Scale UDL Audit: Avoid starting with unwieldy, top-down policy overhauls. Instead, select a single existing activity—such as a school assembly, competition, or enrichment module—and evaluate it against an online UDL checklist. Assess whether the activity provides multiple modes of engagement and representation, adjust accordingly, and share best practices across school networks.

Evaluate How Well You Know Your Students: Review current mechanisms for capturing student voice and emotional well-being. Ensure that children with additional needs—particularly those who struggle with verbal articulation—have clear, accessible channels to communicate how they feel within the school environment.

Key Takeaways 
Access vs Belonging: Access is an administrative and policy metric; belonging is an emotional experience rooted in peer credibility and psychological safety.

UDL Foundation: Inclusive design must be proactive rather than retrofitted, embedding flexible choices for expressing understanding.

AI Strategy: Adopt a barrier-first approach to AI deployment, prioritising expanded learning reach and accessibility over task speed.

Implementation: Start small with targeted UDL audits of single activities rather than top-down policy mandates.

Audio and written summaries powered by Gemini Notebook, a free generative AI tool grounded in your provided sources. Try Gemini Notebook for free. You can listen to the audio overview of the session here.