What “diverse” means for an author
Learners differ in many ways at once: the language they speak at home, the language of instruction, the schooling they have had, the examples that feel familiar to them, and how much they already know about your subject. An author cannot design for every combination. The realistic goal is to make a resource understandable to a wide range of readers and easy for others to adapt to a narrower group.
Openness helps with the second part. Because open licenses allow adaptation, a teacher in another country or community can translate or localize your work, provided you make that easy to do. This article looks at the writing choices that make resources work across differences, and at the practical steps of adapting them.
Write in plain language
For many readers, the text is being read in a second or third language. Plain writing is one of the most useful things you can offer them, and it benefits native speakers too. Some habits that help:
- Prefer short sentences with one main idea each.
- Choose common words where they are accurate, and explain technical terms when first used.
- Avoid idioms, sports metaphors and cultural references that depend on a particular country.
- Keep sentence structure consistent, and avoid long chains of nested clauses.
- Use the same term for the same idea throughout, rather than varying it for style.
Plain language is not the same as simplifying the ideas. You can keep the content demanding while making the wording clear. For learners still developing their English proficiency, a short glossary at the start or end of a unit, with simple definitions, can make a large difference. Pairing difficult terms with a small diagram is also helpful.
Support different levels of prior knowledge
In an open setting you rarely know what a reader has already studied. Two approaches work together:
State prerequisites. Say at the top of each unit what a reader should already know, and where they could review it. This lets confident learners proceed and others fill gaps first.
Layer the explanation. Start with a brief, concrete explanation, then offer extra detail for those who want it. Optional “if you want to go deeper” or “if you need a reminder” sections let you serve several levels without splitting the resource in two.
Worked examples with the steps shown are particularly useful for readers new to a topic, and the support can be gradually reduced in later examples. How much support is best depends on the learner, and research on this area is nuanced, so offering a choice is usually safer than assuming one path suits everyone.
Choose examples with care
Examples carry hidden assumptions. A question about a family holiday, a mortgage, a particular sport or a supermarket chain presumes experience that not every reader shares. Where possible:
- Use varied settings: a market stall, a farm, a clinic, a workshop, an online shop.
- Use a mix of names from different traditions, or neutral labels such as “Person A”.
- Avoid stereotypes about who does which job or who is good at which subject.
- Keep units, currencies and date formats clear, and consider offering alternatives.
Representing cultural diversity respectfully means more than inserting varied names. If you draw on the knowledge or stories of a community, such as indigenous knowledge, involve members of that community, credit them properly and respect any conditions they set on sharing. Do not assume that being openly licensed means everything is free to take. Questions of ownership and cultural protocols can be sensitive and can differ between communities, so seek guidance from the people concerned.
Design for translation and adaptation
If you expect others to translate your work, make that practical:
- Keep text as real text, not embedded in images, so it can be edited.
- Provide editable source files in an open format, as well as a finished version.
- Leave room for text expansion, since translated text is often longer or shorter than the original.
- Avoid wordplay and jokes that rarely survive translation.
- Mark clearly which parts are examples that should be swapped for local ones.
Machine translation can help readers get a rough sense of a text, but it makes mistakes, especially with technical vocabulary, so a human review is advisable before a translated version is relied on for teaching.
Also record the license and the original authors on every version so that adaptations stay properly credited. If you adapt another author’s resource, follow the license conditions, which usually include attribution and sometimes require that adaptations be shared under the same terms.
Offer several ways in
Learners differ in how they like to receive information, but it is worth being careful here. The popular idea that people have fixed learning styles is not well supported by evidence. A more reliable reason to offer more than one format is that it gives learners options and removes barriers: a transcript helps someone who cannot play audio, a diagram helps someone struggling with long text, and audio helps someone who is tired or commuting. Combining words and pictures sensibly is a better-supported principle than matching content to supposed styles.
This overlaps with the broader idea of universal design, which aims to build flexibility in from the start rather than adding adjustments afterward. Captions, text alternatives for images, and a clear heading structure are part of this.
Check with real readers
The best test of whether a resource works for diverse learners is to try it with some. Ask a small group from different backgrounds to work through a unit and tell you where they stumbled: unfamiliar words, unclear instructions, examples that did not make sense. Even a few responses can reveal problems you could not see yourself. Where you cannot test directly, ask a colleague who works with the target group to review the draft.
Keep feedback channels open after publication. People who adapt your work for their own communities often have the most useful suggestions for improving the original.
Common pitfalls
- Assuming that translation alone makes a resource suitable for another community; examples, assumptions and teaching style may also need to change.
- Treating “diverse learners” as a single group with a single need.
- Using patronizing or overly simplified content when the real need is clearer wording.
- Forgetting that some learners have limited connectivity or older devices, which affects media choices.
None of these has a perfect solution. Aim for resources that are clear, flexible and easy to adapt, and expect to revise them as you learn from the people who use them.