MESA Supplement Website

How to Fully Include Students with Disabilities

The multidisciplinary activities of the MESA book series, published by Addison Wesley (see titles listed below), offer students opportunities for hands-on experiences. The teacher's guide assumes that participants have the abilities of an average student. Nonetheless, you can expect to have students with a wide range of abilities and disabilities in your classes. This website provides you with suggested accommodations for students with specific types of disabilities participating in each activity.

For general guidelines for addressing the needs of students with disabilities while conducting the activities in the MESA books, consult the MESA book addendum. Universal design is a proactive practice for designing educational products and environments to be welcoming and accessible to all students. For more information about accommodations for students with disabilities in science classes, consult

• Working Together: Science Teachers and Students with Disabilities and view the complementary video
• The Winning Equation: Access + Attitude = Success in Math and Science and view the complementary video
• Working Together: K-12 Teachers and Students with Disabilities
• the AccessSTEM Knowledge Base
• Equal Access: Universal Design of Instruction
• Equal Access: Science and Students with Sensory Impairments and view the complementary video
• Making Science Labs Accessible to Students with Disabilities
• Accessible Science Equipment

Each MESA book covers a specific multidisciplinary topic. To learn about accommodations for a specific book or book section, select a book title below:

• In the Air
• Classifying Fingerprints
• Secret Codes
• Measuring Earthquakes
• Designing Environments
• Packaging and the Environment
• Investigating Apples
• In the Pharmacy
• Measuring Dinosaurs
• In the Wind