20 Tips for Instructors about Making Online Learning Courses Accessible

[Music]

>>Narrator: Sheryl Burgstahler
shares historical highlights

and tips to create accessible
online learning activities.

[Music]

>> Sheryl Burgstahler:
I’m going to share with you

a little bit about
access to online learning,

what instructional designers and
faculty members need to know.

Often when I’m talking
about this topic,

faculty members will say,
"I don’t have enough time,"

and then, if it’s not that,
"I don’t have enough funding."

That gets some support.

"And I don’t have enough
technical support for me."

Well, what I can come back with,
politely, of course,

is there are some things
that we can all do.

We don’t need to
do them all at once.

We can do them incrementally
but make our courses accessible.

That led to this particular
publication called

20 Tips For Teaching An
Accessible Online Course.

And so I’m going to go
through that a little bit.

It’s part of our
AccessCyberlearning project,

one of our resources
for other projects.

And I’ll just step back
for a minute, back to 1995.

I actually taught
the first online course

here at the
University of Washington.

That’s kind of a little known
fact about me.

It was in 1995 and I’m still
shocked to this day

that they hired
an 18-year-old girl

to be offering these courses!

[Audience laughs]

But I was quite precocious
so, I offered the class

with Dr. Norm Coombs at the
Rochester Institute of Technology.

He and I had been giving talks
on accessible technology

around the country

and the University of Washington
had a very extensive

distance learning program,
all based on the postal mail system.

And so they mailed out things
including videos to students.

And they proctored their exams in
proctoring centers

around the country

so it was pretty elaborate
what we had here.

And I wanted to make sure, my
kind of somewhat hidden agenda was

I wanted to make sure
these online courses

would be accessible to
individuals with disabilities

but I also was kind of curious if you
could really deliver a class online

that was anything close to
what you could do onsite.

Particularly something like
assistive technology,

which usually people touch things
and manipulate things.

So I recruited Norm Coombs
to teach this class with me,

Adaptive Technology for
People With Disabilities.

Now back then, for those of you
that are old enough to remember,

people communicated using email
and we had discussion lists, email-based,

and we had a Gopher server - Gopher from
the University of Minnesota, of course.

It was kind of an online
catalogue system, all text-based.

We’d get into a little outline
of your resources,

and then it would link to
resources around the country.

And we actually received an award for
having the most comprehensive Gopher server

for people with disabilities
in the world.

And I don’t know if
we had any competition.

But anyway, that was
our course library.

Then we used Telnet,

which allowed us to log onto
NASA and other big computing systems.

The students had to actually
learn a different language

to correspond with these systems, with each
one,

because they developed their own interface.

And then we used File Transfer Protocol
to move files around,

to get images, whatever,
that we wanted to move around.

So it was pretty basic technology.

All the materials that we had
we put in text format.

You kind of had to.
It was on Gopher.

So we did that.

We did use postal mail.

We mailed out publications,
we mailed out videos.

DO-IT was around.

We had already made some
DO-IT videos on VHS tapes

and they were captioned and
audio described, believe it or not.

And we mailed those out to
the participants in the class.

We kind of got the class
pretty much together.

I gave them Norm Coombs’ resume

and they approved him as an instructor
here at the University of Washington.

And then it sort of came out
in the meeting one time

when we were talking about
proctoring exams

and I said, "Well, we really
can’t do proctoring exams

in these different locations because
people write those out longhand

and Norm Coombs is blind
so he won’t be able to read those

if they’re not in electronic form
and I’ll have to grade all those myself

and I’m really not interested
in having to do all that work.

Or we have to hire somebody
to go over to RIT and read to him."

Now I have to say that the
program people were not amused

by the fact that I kind of
dropped this idea,

this piece of information about
Norm Coombs being blind.

I thought it was a little bit humorous
and I really didn't think

it had anything to do with them
accepting him as an instructor

even back in those days.

And so they allowed us to go forward
with this

and we offered this course
to be fully accessible

and the distance learning program
kind of the end of the first time we offered

it

she said, "Well tell me, Sheryl,
I mean after all this work,

how many people with disabilities
even took this course?

So how do you even know
if it's successful?"

And I said, "Well I am proud to say
we have absolutely no idea

how many people with disabilities
took this course.

Because we just designed it
to be fully accessible."

No one had to disclose.

So they weren't exactly amused
but we continued to teach that class.

But I'm happy to say our
first class was fully accessible.

In applying universal design
to online learning,

we provide multiple ways to gain knowledge,
interact, and demonstrate knowledge.

We have this publication
that we've created on

20 tips for teaching an online course
that is fully accessible

to people with disabilities.

Nine of the tips are about webpages
and documents, images, videos;

and the other 11 are
instructional methods.

And when I'm working with faculty
who are reluctant to admit

that they might be able to adopt
some accessible technology practices,

I ask them to really take the challenge
of selecting a few of these

to make their courses accessible.

And it really points out
how the faculty need

to work with the technology people

but also the designers in
developing their online courses.

And I'm going to go
through these fairly quickly.

But just to kind of
give you an idea

of what things we tell
faculty members and designers

to look for in online learning.

Providing clear and consistent
layouts and organizational schemes.

That is something that
every instructor should do

to present their material clearly.

Of course those layouts should be
apparent to someone who is blind.

So we structure the headings to
make sure that someone can access them

using screen readers and see
organization of the content

rather than just dumping a bunch of text
that would have to be read

from the beginning to the end.

So this faculty member would also use
descriptive wording for hyperlinks.

Since someone using a screen reader
might want to tab through

and go to each one of the
web resources on a page

so they could see
where they want to start

or whether they want to go
to those resources at all.

And so if you use the wording
on each of your underlined text,

"click here,"

that person is going to be able
to read all those no problem

but what they will read is

"click here, click here,
click here, click here."

In contrast if you provide
descriptive wording that's underlined,

that link might say
"DO-IT website."

Then, that person would know
what they're going to be linking to

and can decide then if that's
where they want to be.

A very simple thing.

This doesn't take any more time
than putting the "click here" there.

But it makes it accessible
to people using screen readers.

PDFs, kind of tricky.

We can make them accessible
but you have to ask yourself,

why again was I creating that PDF?

Sometimes you're
forced to do it

because it's a PDF that's
out on the internet.

But if you're creating a lesson or even
your syllabus in your online class,

do you want to include
that as a PDF file

or do you want to cut and paste
the content right into the

learning management system itself
into that window so it is text

and then use the features within Canvas
or what other system you're using

to structure the headings so you've
made it accessible that way.

That's what I do.

The text descriptions of the content
when images are provided.

Whenever there is an image that's presented,
you just describe that text.

And some learning management systems
actually prompt you to do that.

So you're reminded but
even if it doesn't,

you can put that in.

So sometimes people will say,

"Well, but it's just
a little logo here.

It doesn't mean anything.

Why do I have to have
the text description?"

Well the person who's blind
and trying to access your course

doesn't know that that image doesn't
include anything really meaningful.

For our DO-IT website, we have on our logo
on our website we have "DO-IT logo"

as an alternate text
for that image.

Some people say we should
describe what it looks like.

Other people would say it doesn't
really matter what it looks like

but it's important that a person
who is blind knows that it's a logo

that they do or don’t
need to pay attention to.

Using large bold fonts on uncluttered
pages with plain backgrounds.

With the PowerPoints we’re using,
we're assuming that their vision is such

that it's difficult for them
to see the content

and so we just automatically
provide large bold fonts

on uncluttered pages
with plain backgrounds.

High contrast color combinations.

You usually can figure
this out on your own.

Sometimes you go to a website
and it's light green on dark green.

It's like what were people
thinking about that?

And to avoid the problematic ones
for those are colorblind,

so red and green, for instance.

There are resources on the web actually
that you can test some of these things

so it's not hard to find.

Content and navigation is accessible
using the keyboard alone.

Sometimes there's not
a lot you can do about that

if it's the product that
you're using is the problem.

But if there are things that
you have control over,

then you need to be aware of that.

But it's important to kind of
remember that, that issue,

and to continually work like say

in this Canvas work group
that we have going nationwide

to give input to Canvas creators and others about the inaccessibility of something

So it's good to kind of know that.

Make sure that the videos are
captioned and audio described.

Captioning first. Audio described
is important, too, but as I said

if you're creating your own video,
often you can create it in a way

that it's fairly accessible for people
who are blind right from the beginning.

That is going to take some
technical support probably.

You can read the content on
our Accessible IT website

but you might have to have
somebody help you do that.

Make sure that your course is designed
for a wide range of technical skills.

This is another thing that doesn't take a
rocket scientist to figure out how to do this

but so often we’re used to using
the technology that we’re using

and we don't tell students
how to use it.

We have to remember that even if you have
some tech savvy students in your course,

they might never have
used that product.

This might be the first
Canvas class that they've taken.

So providing a little overview
of the technology you're using

to deliver that class
and where they can get help,

just include that in the syllabus or
in early instruction in a lesson or two.

Make sure the content is
presented in multiple ways

and so if you're using
a video in the class,

make sure it's captioned.

A transcript is nice
but I also recommend

that you provide sort of a
different version of it

because we present content
differently when we're writing

than is presented in a video.

So many of our videos have a handout
connected with them online.

I guess it's not a handout but it's
a publication with that content.

But it's written in a way that you
normally would write that content.

And so just because you have a video
doesn't mean you shouldn't do that other,

and that can be within your lesson in a class
or it can be a separate document.

So that's providing that
content in multiple ways.

Acronyms and jargon,
we talked about that.

Make sure you spell them out or
don't use them. And define them.

Instructions and expectations.

Make sure that they're really clear.

Sometimes putting content
in the syllabus

that maybe years ago
I would've maybe given later.

I’d think maybe this assignment’s
only going to take a week

so I'll give it in
the middle of the class.

Well maybe it's going to take
somebody longer than that

so give them the assignment
at the beginning.

They shouldn't be penalized
for actually working ahead.

Even if they can't do all parts of it
they can at least be thinking about it

in terms of what you’re teaching.
And make the expectations clear.

Use a rubric or use other techniques

to make sure they know what they're
supposed to be able to produce.

Make sure that examples and assignments
are relevant to a diverse audience.

And so just sit back and think about it.
You don't have to survey your students.

You can just think of a variety of people
that might be accessing that class.

It might be an older student.
You've got male and female students.

You might know that people from a lot
of different disciplines take your course

whatever it happens to be on,
so try to have a few examples

of a concept that might appeal
to a different audience.

Make sure that outlines and other
scaffolding tools are provided

so that's what would apply to online learning.

Be sure to provide adequate
opportunities for practice

so in an online class sometimes I would have
something required like required reading

and then if I think some people might
want to have more instruction

or it might be just a little diversion
of what we're talking about,

then I put in all caps
the name of that lesson

and in parentheses "optional"

and so that is a cue for someone
who wants to do a little bit more,

feels like they need more practice
or a little more information.

But I’m not requiring that
all the students do that.

People have different levels of knowledge
coming into your course

but also different learning styles

and it might take them longer
or a shorter period of time

to learn something

but also people require, some
require more practice than others.

Provide adequate time for activities
and projects and tests.

A lot of this as I said can be solved
by just putting it in the syllabus.

Another thing that I've done
in teaching online learning

is asked the program managers

if I can open my class
a week before it really starts.

And I've always gotten
permission for that.

It makes it more difficult for
the instructor, I'll say that,

because you've got students
who start early and move forward.

Well, I figure that's my problem.

And so I don't want to discourage
people from moving forward.

Maybe they're going to be
really busy in a couple of weeks.

So they want to get ahead but

I make it real clear
what discussion we’re on

and when we're discussing
certain topics

so they have to kind of stay
with the class in that regard.

And I always send out a notice
to the whole class

saying "I opened this class a week early
so you people can get started.

If you haven't started
you’re not behind.

We're starting today."

And so I kind of don't let
the class get away from me

even if I’m letting
some students work ahead.

Providing feedback on
parts of an assignment

and corrective opportunities

and so if you're assigning
a big project for a class

to at least invite students

to give you a draft of
what they're going to do

and you can give feedback on it
or part of it say you're open to that

or you can actually build it
into the assignments

and say everyone has to turn in
an outline or whatever

by such and such a date.

So the students don't have
that experience

where they finish the whole project
and then you look at it and say,

"Oh they didn't understand
what I was asking for."

And for options for
communicating and collaborating

and for demonstrating learning so
sometimes you can just give students options

and say the test is going to be
three different choices.

You can present your knowledge
in three different ways.

Or projects - the same thing.

You can give them options for
what project they want to do

or another way to do it is to have
just multiple things throughout the course

so because sometimes you want everybody
to do things in a certain way.

So you want projects and you want
to have short answer tests

and you want to have true and false
and multiple choice and whatever it is,

or students creating videos or
whatever you have in the class.

Just make sure there's a variety
so that if someone isn't very good

at one of those things, they can still
end up doing well in the class.

So that's just a simple overview
of what you can do in an online course

to make it more accessible
to students with disabilities.

Not too difficult and
not too technical.

And what I challenge
faculty members to do then,

particularly the ones that say, "Well,
I just don't have time to do this,"

is to look through here
and circle a few things,

circle a few numbers of things
that they can do like right away.

And no one has trouble finding them,
but even if you just did a few of these things

given you aren't doing them already,
it would make a better class.