Assistive Technologies
The world of assistive technologies (ATs) has been a bit of theme at work this week. One of our clients know that they have learners who use JAWS, Dragon, etc. and they really want to be sure that our products are compatible and will work properly with these ATs. I've had several phone conversations about this and I've gone back to one of the MA modules I studied and done some extra research, as well as using my own personal experiences, to come up with some clear answers.
Dragon
I am a Dragon user. I got it when I started my Master's course with the Open University. I had a disability assessment and some very nice chap visited me at home, asked hundreds of questions about my condition and how it affects me, and then recommended a chair and Dragon. Thankfully these were paid for by DSA (disabled student allowance), as they were both pretty pricey!
So, what is Dragon? It's basically a speech to text tool. I use it most for producing lengthy documents, where typing would cause me difficulty. I wear a headset and dictate what I want to type. What I wasn't sure about, was how this related to eLearning, where no typing is taking place. Then I realised, it's also a navigation tool. So I went through some of my work and navigated using Dragon. I loaded the eLearning and put on my headset and navigated right through without touching the mouse or the keyboard once. I just spoke. Tab. Tab. Tab. Press enter. Tab. Tab. Press enter. Etc.
If you develop eLearning in Storyline, it's easy to get the tab order right, so that it works with Dragon. The tab order automatically creates items in the order that the developer created them on the screen. So, if you create the title first, then some text, then an image, then the next button, all would be well. In reality, that's not how it happens. I create my buttons first and then copy and paste them onto each page, so they appear first in the tab order, which is wrong for Dragon users. So I need to open the tab order and reorder the items. If I do that, it will work in Dragon. Of course, it's always wise to test it.
JAWS
JAWS is the other way round - text to speech. People with visual impairments might use JAWS. It reads each item from the screen out loud. Again, it is navigated by tab order, with the user using the tab button on the keyboard to go through it. So those tabs have to be in the right order again. But this isn't a problem now, because I just got that right for Dragon users. So what else do I need to do?
The trouble is, not everything on the page is text. In a piece of eLearning, there would be pictures, charts, buttons... all kinds of non-text items. These cannot be read by JAWS unless I tell it what they are. So when sorting out the tab order, I also need to give each non-text item some text description.
For example, if I put a picture of a sad looking child on a piece of Safeguarding eLearning, to make it interesting, I can either decide that the image isn't important, and delete it from the tab order, or I can give it alternate text. I might say "Photograph of a sad-looking child with sunken eyes". If I delete it from the tab order, the JAWS user won't even know it is there. If I give it text, they will. Of course, some images on the page are not relevant, so these are better deleted. The arrow at the bottom that takes you to the next page, however, it crucial, so I name it "Next button".
Is this just eLearning?
No! The main place where this occurs every day, is on the Web. Websites should, by law, be accessible. If you create a website, and it has images or other non-text items on any page, you should give alternative text descriptions so that JAWS can read it. In html, this goes in the alt tag.
E.g. <img src="source - where the image lives" alt="describe the image for JAWS users" height="500px" />
If you use an interface of some kind, like Wordpress or Blogger, there will be some option when you upload a picture, to give it alt text. Please give this some thought, not just because it's the law, but because it's really frustrating for people with disabilities when they know their needs could be catered for but somebody couldn't be bothered.
All this AT stuff is a really good way of you communicating the message that everybody matters. It's your way of saying that you believe in equal access or you don't. I would really encourage you to do something different next time you blog, design, create, etc. Make it even more accessible.
Dragon
I am a Dragon user. I got it when I started my Master's course with the Open University. I had a disability assessment and some very nice chap visited me at home, asked hundreds of questions about my condition and how it affects me, and then recommended a chair and Dragon. Thankfully these were paid for by DSA (disabled student allowance), as they were both pretty pricey!
So, what is Dragon? It's basically a speech to text tool. I use it most for producing lengthy documents, where typing would cause me difficulty. I wear a headset and dictate what I want to type. What I wasn't sure about, was how this related to eLearning, where no typing is taking place. Then I realised, it's also a navigation tool. So I went through some of my work and navigated using Dragon. I loaded the eLearning and put on my headset and navigated right through without touching the mouse or the keyboard once. I just spoke. Tab. Tab. Tab. Press enter. Tab. Tab. Press enter. Etc.
If you develop eLearning in Storyline, it's easy to get the tab order right, so that it works with Dragon. The tab order automatically creates items in the order that the developer created them on the screen. So, if you create the title first, then some text, then an image, then the next button, all would be well. In reality, that's not how it happens. I create my buttons first and then copy and paste them onto each page, so they appear first in the tab order, which is wrong for Dragon users. So I need to open the tab order and reorder the items. If I do that, it will work in Dragon. Of course, it's always wise to test it.
JAWS
JAWS is the other way round - text to speech. People with visual impairments might use JAWS. It reads each item from the screen out loud. Again, it is navigated by tab order, with the user using the tab button on the keyboard to go through it. So those tabs have to be in the right order again. But this isn't a problem now, because I just got that right for Dragon users. So what else do I need to do?
The trouble is, not everything on the page is text. In a piece of eLearning, there would be pictures, charts, buttons... all kinds of non-text items. These cannot be read by JAWS unless I tell it what they are. So when sorting out the tab order, I also need to give each non-text item some text description.
For example, if I put a picture of a sad looking child on a piece of Safeguarding eLearning, to make it interesting, I can either decide that the image isn't important, and delete it from the tab order, or I can give it alternate text. I might say "Photograph of a sad-looking child with sunken eyes". If I delete it from the tab order, the JAWS user won't even know it is there. If I give it text, they will. Of course, some images on the page are not relevant, so these are better deleted. The arrow at the bottom that takes you to the next page, however, it crucial, so I name it "Next button".
Is this just eLearning?
No! The main place where this occurs every day, is on the Web. Websites should, by law, be accessible. If you create a website, and it has images or other non-text items on any page, you should give alternative text descriptions so that JAWS can read it. In html, this goes in the alt tag.
E.g. <img src="source - where the image lives" alt="describe the image for JAWS users" height="500px" />
If you use an interface of some kind, like Wordpress or Blogger, there will be some option when you upload a picture, to give it alt text. Please give this some thought, not just because it's the law, but because it's really frustrating for people with disabilities when they know their needs could be catered for but somebody couldn't be bothered.
All this AT stuff is a really good way of you communicating the message that everybody matters. It's your way of saying that you believe in equal access or you don't. I would really encourage you to do something different next time you blog, design, create, etc. Make it even more accessible.
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