How to Create
Accessible Course
Materials
Yasmin Mahasongkham
Highline College
What is OER?
• OER = open educational resources
• “Open education resources are free and openly licensed
educational materials that can be used for teaching,
learning, research, and other purposes.”
-The William and Flora Hewlett Foundation
Current work around OER…
• Faculty Learning Committee
• Meet as a committee
• Workshops and presentations during Open Ed Week
• Mini projects where librarians are paired with
instructors to create course materials using OER
Advantages and Disadvantages of OER
Advantages
• Instructors have
intellectual
freedom
• replace textbooks
• relatively free…low
cost
• Fact: students at
Highline spent an
average of $300$700 on books per
quarter.
Disadvantages
• Intellectual property
and unclear copyright
laws
• Quality
• Accuracy
Disability Office role in OER
• Is the material accessible?
• If faculty are moving towards OER, who is
responsible for making sure the content is
accessible?
• What new accessibility issues will arise from
using OER?
How to make your
course materials
accessible
A summary of Module 8 Accessibility from How to Use OER
training by SBCTC
Think UDL
(universal design for learning)
• Multiple means of
• Representation (written, audio, and videos)
• Action/Assessment (navigation and
assignment format)
• Engagement (offer options, flexibility)
When building your course…
• Start with text
• Add alternative means to support text
(audio/video/images)
• Provide options for submitting work
• Break down course content into sections
• Keep content open continuously
Make images accessible
• Screen readers will skip over an image if there is no alt text
• Provide alt text for images (right click image, click “format
picture”, add alt text)
• Avoid decorative images
• If you do, use “ “ (quotation mark, space, quotation mark) in the
alt text field
How to add alt text to images
Use captions and transcripts
• Provide transcripts for
audio recordings
• Provide captions for
videos
• Use a vendor
• Do it yourself
• Provide a script
• Avoid automatic
captions (not
accurate)
Use Headings and style guides
• Headings provide structure, like an outline
• Screen readers can differentiate titles from content so the
reader can quickly locate page numbers and sections of
documents
• Limit use of bold, italics, underline and color
Example of not using headings
https://foothillcollege.instructure.com/courses/197/pages/document-headings-and-screen-readers
Use descriptive hyperlinks
• Embed link to relevant text (highlight descriptive
text, right click, and paste URL)
• Avoid “click here” or “more…” and using full web
addresses
Example of hyperlinks
NO
YES
• http://www.openwa.org
/module-8/
• Learn more about
Module 8 Accessibility
on the Open Educational
Resource for Washington
State website.
• Click here to go to
Module 8 Accessibility at
the Open Educational
Resource for Washington
State website.
Avoid using only color to communicate
• Some people are color blind and may not be able
to differentiate between colors.
• Find an alternate way to represent meaning of
color
Example of how to not use color
Instead of
finding states
by colors, list
states after
colors.
example:
Dark blue:
Incumbent
Democrat
(Washington,
Oregon, New
York, etc.;)
Choose and use a textbook that is
accessible
• Remember that your campus is liable if you
purchase a book that is not accessible!
• Ask publishers about accessibility! Put the
pressure on! Use your buying power!
• Don’t require a textbook (Use OER??)
Questions to ask publishers
Hello Publisher Representatives!
Befor e telling me about your textbook options, please know that I am committed to ensuring the accessibility
of my course materials for all students, including those with disabilities, and I need you to be able to answer
the following questions about your pr oduct:
Are your ebooks and online resources compatible with screen-readers
like JAWS?
●
●
If there is a study website or online component, is it fully accessible?
●
Are videos captioned and audio recordings transcribed?
Can all interactivity (media players, quizzes, flashcards, etc.) be
completed by keyboard alone (no mouse required)?
●
Is there any documentation available (VPAT) that confirms accessibility
or usability testing results? ●
Did you know? In accor dance with the Amer icans with Disabilities Act (ADA), institutions of higher education
ar e r equir ed to adhere to accessibility standar ds when designing, adopting and pr ocur ing educational
mater ials and r esources for the deliver y of cour se cur r icula.
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Quick tips to use PPT, MS WORD, Canvas
wisely!
• Use Accessibility Checker feature
• POWERPOINT:
• USE: slide templates, contrasting colors, alt text for images, clear
language, lots of space
• AVOID: animations, timed presentations, URL addresses
• MS WORD:
• Use list formatting tool (not your own), headings from style
guides, alt text
• CANVAS:
• Use headings, provide alt text for images
• .PDF
• Convert .PDF into a readable .PDF (not one whole image), add
tags
Resources to help build an
accessible course
• Module 8 – Accessibility Open Washington Open Educational
Resources Network
• Web Accessibliity in Mind – WebAIM
• University of Washington: Creating Accessible Documents
Feedback from instructors on
Accessibility module…
• Can be difficult and tedious to implement accessibility
• Too many steps, hard to remember
• Not intentional to make course inaccessible
Examples of incidents where
courses became inaccessible
• How many of you have faculty who use videos in their
class but have no caption?
• How many of you have faculty who require students to
purchase a textbook that does not have an alternate
format?
What is your campus doing to
make sure instructors are
creating accessible course
materials???
Suggestions???