What Is Learner Variability?
Learner variability is the understanding that every learner has a unique learning profile of strengths and challenges, and supports both students who struggle and those who thrive.
Learner Variability Project
Digital Promise’s Learner Variability Project (LVP) builds on emerging research on learner variability and seeks to uncover strategies to meet learners where they are across varied contexts and needs.
Audiences
EdTech Developers, Educators, Learners, Policymakers, Researchers, School and System Leaders
Topics
Learning Environments
Adult and Workforce Learning, Early Childhood Learning, K-12
Explore More From This Program
Our Learner Models
Learner Models are a key feature of the Learner Variability Navigator (LVN). They offer a clear, research-based picture of the key factors—from brain science to social-emotional needs—that make every student’s learning journey unique.
At the core of the Learner Variability Navigator (LVN) are our Learner Models—holistic, research-grounded frameworks that map the different factors shaping how students learn.
To build these models, our research team reviewed studies in psychology, neuroscience, and the learning sciences. National experts guided every step to ensure each model gives teachers a trustworthy, whole-child understanding of how students learn.
To create each of these Learner Models, we followed a literature review methodology led by learner variability research scientists trained and with expertise within the field connected to learning (e.g., learning sciences, psychology, neuroscience). The process was overseen by an advisory board of leading national experts with diverse expertise, both in the content area of each model, as well as the fields of cognitive sciences, neuroscience, learning sciences, and social and emotional learning.
Learner Variability Navigator
Explore the LVN
Our Learner Variability Navigator (LVN) is a free tool that helps you find research-based strategies to support the whole learner so you can create better learning experiences.
Learn to Design with LV
Our LVN professional learning opportunities aim to empower educators and leaders with an understanding of what learner variability is and how to design for it in their classrooms.
Support Adult Learners
Just like school-aged learners, adult learners also have varying needs and learning profiles, and they need an education that focuses on the whole learner to help them achieve success in postsecondary environments or professional development contexts.
Blogs
Research & Publications
Shifting Mindsets: Designing Lessons for Learner Variability
LVP engaged in a partnership with the national nonprofit DonorsChoose to discover if teachers across the country could use the Learner Variability Navigator (LVN) to find and put in place research-based strategies that address the whole learner.
Strength-Based Teacher Report: IEP Reflection
The IEP Project is designed to support teacher efforts to write IEPs and teacher reports that prioritize students’ strengths and potential, rather than their deficits. The IEP Project Tool was designed for teachers by teachers and can be a powerful tool to spur student success.
Learner Variability Project in the Field: A Guide for Culturally Responsive Practice
This guide provides educators and educator teams with questions and protocols to guide and/or reflect on how to apply culturally responsive instruction practices as they address learner variability.
Professional Services
Partner With Us
Learner Variability Certification
This certification demonstrates an understanding of the wide variability among learners. Without designing for the full diversity of learners, we risk creating inequitable solutions that serve some learners and not others, widening opportunity gaps.
Interested in our LVN Integration?
Learn about our API or other ways to integrate our research on learner variability directly into your edtech tools.
Digital Promise Yourway
Built with input from teachers, this suite of AI-powered instructional tools turns our learner variability research into instant, classroom-ready strategies to help educators personalize instruction for every student.
