Making Online Learning Accessible Why, What, How Ira David Socol James Socol Michigan State University College of Education

What is Accessibility? What does it look like?

Basics Firefox plus Add- Ons Click-Speak FireVox DSpeech Ghotit Natural Reader WordTalk PowerTalk

Simple Mac OS TTS Open System Preferences - it’s the fourth item in the Apple menu. In the “System” section, usually about the fourth line of icons, there is an icon labeled “Speech” which looks like an old fashioned microphone. Click on the Speech icon.

Simple Mac OS TTS Select any key combination that isn’t already used for something else. Now all you need to do is select some text in an application - I suggest you try it first with Safari or Text Edit - and hit your keys and you should hear Mac OS X read out whatever you have selected!

On Line Text-To-Speech http://vozme.com/ http://spokentext.net/ http://www.yakitome.com/

Phone Text-To-Speech http://www.dial2do.com/ VLingo

Phone Speech-to-Text http://www.abbyme.com/

Phone Text Conversion http://www.scanr.com/

PDF

Creating Accessible PDFs from Microsoft Word http://www.wac.ohio-state.edu/pdf/word/index.html

Creating Accessible PDFs from Scanned Documents http://www.wac.ohio-state.edu/pdf/scan/index.html

Creating Accessible PDFs from Online Sources http://www.wac.ohio-state.edu/pdf/web/index.html

Accessible PDFs Guidelines/Standards http://www.wac.ohio-state.edu/pdf/guidelines.htm

Word

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

PowerPoint

Creating Accessible Microsoft PowerPoints http:// www.webaim.org/techniques/powerpoint /

Video

Creating Accessible OnLine Video http://www.accesselearning.net/mod4/4_01.php

Web, Blogs, Wikis, Forums

Odiogo http:// www.odiogo.com /

Link Testing http://www.wac.ohio-state.edu/tutorials/links-testing.htm

Creating Accessible OnLine Environments http:// www.accesselearning.net /

Accessible Design is Good Design http://www.wac.ohio-state.edu/tutorials/access-distance-learning.htm

Dive into Accessibility (downloadable book) http:// diveintoaccessibility.org /

Traditional Books

OnLine Sources Project Gutenberg Project Gutenberg Australia University of Virginia Literature Network ABC Books Bookshare

Publisher Look Up http:// www.publisherlookup.org /

In Class Face-to-Face

“ Ice Breakers” and Innocent Mistakes humiliation at the start

Be sure that class activities – especially first class session activities, before you know your students well – are not “accidentally” humiliating. Physical movement activities, reading aloud, being forced to write by hand, even speaking in front of a group, can force students into unplanned disclosure .

Handling Computers and Mobiles in the Classroom Alternative Formats Alternative Response Forms What Universal Design looks like

allow students to choose their technology, whether their technology is paper and pen, a computer, or a mobile phone. But engage those technologies. Ask those online to look things up, to share…

or bring the online backchannel to the front of the classroom Today’s Meet

Response to Student Work

Voice Comments in Word in Word2007 http://blogs.techrepublic.com.com/msoffice/?p=439 in Word2003 http://www.ewu.edu/x63277.xml

Ask. How do students want feedback?

http:// www.calstate.edu /accessibility/resources/

Checks and Evaluation http://webaim.org/ http://www.w3.org/WAI/

speedchange.blogspot.com

Making Online Learning Accessible Why, What, How Ira David Socol James Socol Michigan State University College of Education