Supporting Diverse Learners and Creating Accessible Online C

Supporting Diverse Learners and Creating Accessible Online Courses

Four Principles of Web Accessibility

Both state and federal law require community colleges to operate all programs and

activities in a manner which is accessible to qualified individuals with disabilities. (29 U.S.C. §794, 20 U.S.C. § 1405, 42 U.S.C. § 12101, Gov. Code § 11135.)

4. Robust: Content must be robust enough that it can be interpreted reliably by a wide variety of user agents, including assistive technologies, e.g.:

• Maximize compatibility with current and future technologies

3. Understandable: Information and the operation of user interface cannot be beyond the users' comprehension, e.g.:

• Make text readable and understandable
• Make content appear and operate in predictable ways
• Help users avoid and correct mistakes

2. Operable: User interface components and navigation cannot require interaction that a user is unable to perform, e.g.:

• Make all functionality keyboard accessible
• Give users enough time to read and use content
• Do not use content that may cause seizures
• Help users navigate and find content

1. Perceivable: Information and user interface components must be presentable to users in ways they have the ability to comprehend (it can't be invisible to all of their senses), e.g.:

• Provide text alternatives for non-text content
• Provide captions and alternatives for audio and video content
• Make content adaptable, and make it available to assistive technologies
• Use sufficient contrast to make things easy to see and hear

Source: California Community Colleges Distance Education Accessibility Guidelines

One Important General Tip

Ranking of Accessibility

Designing with Accessibility in Mind

Overview of Differing Abilities

Now, let's talk about making each kind of file/media more accessible!

Part of designing files and media with accessibility in mind has to do with how screen readers (used by students with visual impairments) read media.

To make your course more accessible and to support all students' diverse learning styles, whenever possible, offer course content (especially important lessons) in multiple formats.

This video helps show how screen readers work (the screen reader reading a website starts around the 6:24 mark):

Examples:

• Give a lesson in both PowerPoint and video formats (for the video, you can make a screenshot video where you lecture over the PowerPoint)
• Provide content (a syllabus, for example) in a Canvas Content Page but with the option to download the content as a PDF
• Provide the text of a poem and also a recording of the author reading it

In order for these assistive technologies to work, the original media has to be designed with accessibility in mind.

Making Content Pages Accessible

Things to Consider with Content Pages

6. Use the Canvas Accessibility Checker!

4. Provide concise but descriptive alt text for images.

5. Format tables for screenreaders.

3. Use color judiciously, make sure text has sufficient contrast with the background, and avoid using just color for emphasis or to convey meaning.

2. Use descriptive text for hyperlinks (avoid "Click here" or "Link" or just copying and pasting an entire long link).

Keep in mind that Canvas automatically starts at Header 2, so your title would be Header 2, and every Header after that would be Header 3, Header 4, etc.

1. Use the Rich Content Editor paragraph tool to structure the content.

Avoid using just underline, bold, etc. to structure text. Instead, use the header and paragraph tool.

• The Canvas Accessibility Checker will check anything created in the Rich Content Editor for accessibility issues.
• The Checker will state any accessibility issues with an explanation of how to correct the issues.

• Header row/column
• Table caption
• Checking the reading order

• When using an image URL or an image file, make sure to include your own alt text to describe the image for students using screen readers.
• When using a Flickr image, make sure the alt text actually makes sense for the image.

Without sufficient color contrast between font and background, people who are color blind or have low vision will not benefit from the information.

And using color alone to convey meaning will leave those who are color blind or blind unable to interpret the meaning.

For more information on using color in an accessible way, see the video below on Vimeo at:

• HTML Pages or Content Pages, as they're called in Canvas, tend to be the easiest way to create accessible information because of the Rich Content Editor and the Canvas Accessibility Checker.
• They're also beneficial because students don't need to leave Canvas or download special software to use them.
• The Rich Content Editor allows instructors to edit content without having to know HTML coding.

• Type the text you want to hyperlink
• Highlight the text
• Click the chain link in the Rich Content Editor
• Paste the URL you want to link to

This guide has more information about using the

Canvas Accessibility Checker:

https://community.canvaslms.com/docs/DOC-13345-4152808104

Making Word Documents Accessible

Things to Consider with Word Documents

6. On a PC, use the Accessibility Checker to find accessibility issues.

More resources for creating accessible Word documents:

5. Use descriptive text for hyperlinks--create a link that describes the destination of the link.

3. Add table properties, identify the first row/column as a header row/column, and provide table alt text (in Table Properties).

4. Use alternative text for images by right clicking on the image, clicking "Format Picture" and clicking on "Alt Text."

2. Use list types (numbered or bullet lists) to format lists rather than manually creating lists by hitting the tab key.

1. As with content pages, use headings to organize content and create visual cues (rather than just bold, underline, etc.).

Click on File -> Info -> Check for Issues ->

Select "Check Accessibility" option from menu

You can highlight the phrase you want hyperlinked, right click, and add the link.

This will provide a screen reader user with additional information.

This allows screen readers to pick up on this structure.

• Word is versatile and offers ease of use for instructors
• It's a good idea to create documents in Word and convert them to PDFs so students can open the documents even if they don't have Word
• You can also point students to free resources like Open Office that allow students to open Word documents

• Creating Accessible Word Documents: http://webaim.org/techniques/word/

• Using the Accessibility Checker: https://support.office.com/en-us/article/Use-the-Accessibility-Checker-on-your-Windows-desktop-to-find-accessibility-issues-a16f6de0-2f39-4a2b-8bd8-5ad801426c7f

Also, check the reading order of your table by starting in the first cell and clicking tab to navigate through the table--this is the order a screen reader will go through the table.

Making PowerPoints Accessible

Things to Consider with PowerPoint

3. Use the PowerPoint provided slide layouts when building slides to help your slides' reading order remain intact.

2. Check to make sure that all text from the slides appears in the Outline View

More resources for making PowerPoints accessible:

1. The same principles apply in terms of:

• alt text for images,
• descriptive text for hyperlinks,
• formatting lists,
• formatting tables, and
• using color.

• PowerPoint presentations have limited applicability. Because they are, by nature, outlines of our content, most do not contain enough information to be useful vehicles for conveying all of our course content to students.

• That said, you may want to provide PowerPoint files to students to use as study guides, or to supplement a video presentation. Either way, learning to build accessible PowerPoints from the ground up is a useful means of ensuring they are accessible when you want to use them.

• Many of the same principles for creating accessible Word documents also apply in PowerPoint.

• 7 Steps for Creating an Accessible PowerPoint: http://www.dor.ca.gov/disabilityaccessinfo/das-docs/7-steps-2-create-accessible-powerpoint-slideshow.pdf

• Microsoft Best Practices for Making PowerPoints Accessible:

https://support.office.com/en-us/article/Make-your-PowerPoint-presentations-accessible-6f7772b2-2f33-4bd2-8ca7-dae3b2b3ef25?ui=en-US&rs=en-US&ad=US

Making PDFs Accessible

Things to Consider with PDFs

Making PDFs Accessible

1. Start with a well-structured Word or PowerPoint file and convert it to an accessible PDF document.

3. Run Adobe Acrobat built-in Accessibility Checker

Other resources for making PDFs accessible:

2. For scanned documents, run Optical Character Recognition (OCR).

• WebAim article about making accessible PDFs: http://webaim.org/techniques/acrobat/

• It is often easier to create files in another format and convert them to PDFs

• PDFs are useful from the student perspective because Adobe Reader (used to open and view PDFs) is free and easy to download

• Adobe has become an industry leader in accessibility, and they have a very useful Accessibility Checker that can be used once a document is converted to a PDF

In Word:

In PowerPoint:

• Adobe Acrobat Best Practices for PDF Accessibility:

http://www.adobe.com/content/dam/Adobe/en/accessibility/products/acrobat/pdfs/acrobat-x-pdf-accessibility-best-practices.pdf

Note: You will need Adobe Acrobat Pro to do this. You can purchase it at a deep discount at store.collegebuys.org

Note: You will also need Adobe Acrobat Pro to do this.

Making Audio and Video Accessible

Things to Consider with Audio and Video

Making Audio and Video Accessible

3. When doing web conferencing, ConferZoom has the option to request closed captioning.

2. Make sure that videos are captioned for students with hearing impairments; human transcribed captioning is more reliable than automatic captioning.

You can also search YouTube and Google for videos that are human transcribed:

Additionally, instructors can create an account at 3cmediasolutions.org, upload a video, and request to have it captioned.

When I did this, it was ready in less than a week.

1. If you are using an audio file such as a podcast, it's a good idea to make sure there is a transcript or a written version of the information available.

There are multiple options for captioning your own videos in YouTube

• You want to make sure that if a student isn't able to hear the audio, there is another way to access the information

• You want to make sure that if a student isn't able to see a video, there is another way to access the information

To request captioning through 3CMedia Solutions:

• Create a 3C Media Solutions account and log in at http://www.3cmediasolutions.org/
• Click "Media" and upload your video
• Click "Details & Options" for that video
• Click "DECT Captioning Grant" to request captioning

When you email support@ccctechconnect.org, please include:

• The name of your meeting (ex: Week 6 Office Hours)
• The meeting ID# (if you click on the name of the meeting in the Canvas integration, the details about the meeting, including the Session ID# will open in a new tab)
• The date of the meeting
• The start time
• The end time

For more information, please see this guide to requesting live captioning: https://ccctechconnect.zendesk.com/hc/en-us/articles/360015667594-Live-Closed-Captions-How-to-Submit-a-Request

Live caption services are available when there is a student participating in the live class who needs hearing support.

• Send your captioning request at least 5 business days in advance to support@ccctechconnect.org

Note: If you do this, make sure that you have a file of the video because you can't submit a YouTube link.

Designing with Accessibility in Mind Benefits All Students

Creating more accessible online classes really helps all students; students have diverse learning styles and benefit from having access to class content in a variety of ways.

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