Summary

This week you have learned about assistive technologies and how users with impairments interact with online teaching materials. You have learned how to make your online materials more accessible, how to produce alternative versions where necessary, and how to consider accessibility requirements when searching for Open Educational Resources.

Rita certainly has something to say about this week’s materials – let’s see how she’s getting on:

[This animation featured in Week 6 of the original version of this course on OpenLearn.]

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Transcript

Rita
I was quite apprehensive about this week’s topic. I know that there are a lot of different needs and that I could get a student with any of them, at any time. In the classroom it is not usually too difficult to adapt to whatever you are presented with, but I was worried if I did not make my online materials accessible then a student with accessibility needs might get completely stuck, without me being there to immediately resolve the issue as I would in the classroom.
Now I am a little more confident. I know the common accessibility considerations to keep in mind when I create my materials and I think it is interesting that such a wide range of my learners could benefit from improved accessibility. I know that I have to write alternative text for images, transcripts or captions for videos, and alternative formats for learning materials that might be inaccessible. I have quite a few learners where English is their second language. I reckon they would like to read subtitles or transcripts of videos where the speaker is talking fast or using complicated terms, so my accessibility work could potentially benefit those learners, too.
Before I start creating my online learning materials I am going to contact the disability and accessibility specialists at my institution to ask if they have any guidance documents, and maybe to ask if they would look at my materials when I have created them, to see if they can spot any obvious accessibility issues. I would not have had the confidence to do that before, but now I feel that I know enough to make my materials pretty accessible and then they can help me improve them even more.
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Rita says that she was quite apprehensive about this topic. She was already aware that there are a lot of different types of students that could be present in her classroom, and that she would need to adapt her teaching to meet their needs - she is confident that she could help any student who appeared in her classroom. But she wasn’t sure how to make her online materials accessible as in an asynchronous environment she may not be around to help them.

After this week’s material she feels more confident. She has a list of easy things to do when putting materials online to make them more accessible. She plans to make it a regular habit to write alt text for images in her powerpoints, to provide transcripts or captions for videos, and alternative formats for materials that might be inaccessible.

She plans to try to speak more clearly and carefully in her online teaching, to benefit those students who speak different languages or dialects, or who have hearing difficulties.

Rita also plans to contact the disability support staff at the Myanmar Federation of Persons with Disablities or the Myanmar National Association of the Blind

to find out if they have any guidance for how to create accessible online teaching materials. Perhaps they could even review and give feedback on her first attempts. After this week’s study she feels confident enough to produce materials that she thinks should be at least moderately accessible, and then perhaps the disability specialists could help her to improve even further.

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5 This week's quiz