how to create a very accessible online course

Key takeaways for creating accessible online classes

• Organize and structure your course content.
• Use appropriate font colors, types, and sizes.
• Any non-text course elements (e.g. audio, video, images) should have a text alternative such as captions, transcripts,...
• Offer online class content in various ways (video, audio, text).
• All software (e.g. LMS & remote proctoring...

Full Answer

How can I make my online course accessible to students?

If you plan to use a system other than the one adopted by your campus, make sure you are choosing one that is most accessible for your students. In a prominent place in your course, include a statement that informs those students who might experience barriers that you are committed to creating an accessible online course.

How to create accessible eLearning?

6 eLearning Design Tips For Creating Accessible eLearning 1. Ensure That All Components Within Your Course Are Accessible To Learners With Visual, Auditory, Physical, Speech, Cognitive, And Neurological Disabilities. Or, make sure that an alternative is available for them. For example:

Are online courses accessible for people with disabilities?

An online course environment should not pose a barrier to learning, however with widespread adoption of online learning, many online courses are simply not accessible for people with disabilities. The question remains: Why aren’t they?

Why is course accessibility important for online courses?

Online courses open up a wealth of possibilities for many learners, because they add an element of flexibility to the learning experience not always achieved with traditional classroom courses. Ensuring course accessibility takes advantage of this flexibility and maximizes the potential of the learning experience.

How do I create a unique online course?

In this article, you'll find an overview of the 10 major stages of online course creation:Pick the perfect course topic.Ensure your course idea has high market demand.Create Magnetic and Compelling Learning Outcomes.Select and Gather your Course Content.Structure Your Modules and Course Plan.More items...•

How can we make accessible learning?

How to Make Learning Accessible to All StudentsCaption videos. Watching video content has become the preferred learning format for many students. ... Transcribe lectures and seminars. ... Avoid PDFs. ... Check tools for accessibility options.

How can I make my higher education more accessible?

Usually, colleges receive state funding based on the number of students that are enrolled. Instead, higher education can become more accessible if schools tie government funding to performance. In order to do this, states can check the graduation and job placement rates.

How can e learning be accessible to all?

To put it simply, accessibility in e-learning involves using technology and standards to create training content that can be used by all learners, regardless of their ability. "Disability is not just a health problem.

What is accessible online course?

A highly accessible online course will remove the need for many accommodations. If you take the time to follow the suggestions in the previous sections and you are using an accessible LMS, students with disabilities will be included proactively. In fact, sometimes in a well-designed online course, students with disabilities participate seamlessly and do not even need to connect with the disability resource office.

What does it mean when a course is not designed accessibly up front?

If a course is not designed accessibly up front, some students with disabilities are burdened with the need to work with the disability service office to obtain access.

What is accessible video player?

Accessible Video Players. The use of accessible video players is typically a decision made on a college-wide level. If you are using an LMS that allows you to embed your own videos, a good practice is also to include a link that goes directly to the source video (e.g. YouTube, Vimeo, etc.)

Why is it important to organize modules in a similar way?

If you have a course that has several modules , it is helpful to organize each module in a similar way. This predictability helps many students navigate the course and makes it less likely that students will miss an important activity. Below is a sample organization that illustrates this consistency.

What is perceivable content?

Perceivable: The content is designed so that it can be perceived by a wide range of users, regardless of disability. Navigable: Course navigation does not assume that the student is using a specific device, such as a mouse.

Why is sharing accessible videos important?

Share Accessible Videos: Introduction. Video content can be much more engaging than more static content, adding great benefit to an online course. At the same time, if access is not considered, video content can present barriers for many students.

Why is design important in education?

When the design of a course is approached in a thoughtful and inclusive way, it creates an educational environment where all students have an opportunity to learn and demonstrate their mastery of the course content. Design that does not take into consideration the variety ...

What do you need to know about online courses?

You need to use image descriptions and alt-text for all your images and videos, add captions and/or transcripts to videos, and make sure all PDFs have been run through optical character recognition (OCR).

How to make sure students have multiple options for learning?

In addition to transcribing video and audio content, make sure that your students have multiple options for learning. Use a combination of text, video, audio, and images so that important information can be understood in a variety of ways.

When writing content, address the different language skills your students may have?

For example, spelling out acronyms, defining specific terms, and avoiding (or at least explaining) jargon makes content accessible to a variety of learners.

Can people with disabilities take classes online?

Fortunately, high-speed internet access and computers have made it possible for people to learn from anywhere, at any time. People with disabilities can take classes from their homes, but they need accessible online courses that take their needs into account.

Is online course accessibility required?

Online course accessibility is required by law for universities and colleges. The Americans With Disabilities Act (ADA) mandates that colleges and universities using technology to educate students provide students with disabilities the same access to learning as their counterparts.

How to make online courses more accessible?

Do user testing and solicit feedback. This is the most important step you can take toward making your online courses more accessible. By doing simple user testing with your content and soliciting feedback you can identify less visible barriers to access and address them. You can start small.

How to avoid unnecessary barriers in online courses?

1. Ensure text is truly text.

Why did Rodney take an enrichment course?

Rodney, a 15-year-old high school student, decided to take an enrichment course online to learn more about parliamentary government, because he hopes to major in international affairs in college. He signed up for an online course through his local community college and was excited to dive into the material.

Why do courses use CSS float?

Sometimes, when laying out content visually, a course designer neglects to ensure that the content is presented in order in the code. CSS float techniques can allow for highly engaging visual presentation, but the content should remain in a logical order underneath.

Can you upload a course to an online course?

If your course materials are in word-processor documents, or in PDFs or PowerPoint presentations, it can be tempting to simply upload these to your online course and call your course completed.

Can you use HTML in a course?

If your course materials are in word-processor documents, or in PDFs or PowerPoint presentations, it can be tempting to simply upload these to your online course and call your course completed. HTML is the language of the web, and thus is accessible with many different browsers, software packages, and devices.

Tips

Nine tips for course materials follow. Consult Accessible Technology at uw.edu/accessibility for details on the design, selection, and use of accessible IT as well as accessibility checkers that help you identify accessibility problems in materials you use or create:

Acknowledgments

DO-IT (Disabilities, Opportunities, Internetworking, and Technology) serves to increase the success of individuals with disabilities. This publication was partially funded through DO-IT’s AccessCyberlearning project that is supported by the National Science Foundation (NSF Grant #1550477).

How to make an online course more engaging?

An easy way to make online courses more engaging is to stimulate the student visually. This means pictures and videos. The simplest method of using picture and videos in an online course would be constructing your online class more like a PowerPoint presentation:

What is the most important part of creating an online course?

One of the most important components of creating an online course is setting a learning goal for the course . However, there’s more to it. Every online course consists of various sections, and each individual section also needs to have a clear learning goal.

What does it mean to get started teaching?

Which means you need to get your knowledge together.

What is the target audience of an online course?

The target audience is the group of people to whom you are writing your course.

Do you have to create all the content for an online course?

That being said, you don’t need to create all of the content for your online course before you start selling it. It’s always better to start off with a smaller batch of content, as this will allow you to take in feedback from your students and make improvements accordingly.

Is it a waste of time to create an online course?

It’s crucial that you decide on a specific course subject in the beginning phase of creating your online course. Be as specific as possible.

Do online courses require money?

Contrary to popular belief, the process of creating online courses doesn’t require a large chunk of money. If you know what you are doing, you can develop profitable online courses at no cost whatsoever. Creating successful online courses is like building powerful magnets.

What should the topic of an online course be?

The topic for your online course should be either a subject that you’re already knowledgeable about or are willing to invest in learning thoroughly. Either way, you need to be passionate about the subject.

Why is online education important?

Therefore, fostering a community of learners around your course will greatly improve their experience, contributing to the overall success of your course. An active online community can help users share their learning process with a group of peers.

What does competition mean in a course?

Having competition means that people find the topic relevant and helpful for them. It’s also a good idea to create content that can comfortably fit into an existing, tried-and-tested space. Once you have a clear target audience in mind, you are best equipped for later creating and marketing the course.

How to teach a lesson?

Go in a logical order and try to make your ideas evolve naturally from one to the other , to ensure a smooth and frictionless learning process. Remember that teaching is about guiding your audience through an idea, step by step. To make this clear in your course outline, define an objective for each of your lessons.

Do you need to run a test before starting an online course?

Creating an online course requires a lot of hard work and effort on your part, so running a test before you begin will allow you to validate this online business idea as one that will pay itself off down the line.

Can you rent a lesson on a video by video basis?

Individual lessons for rent or purchase: Allow users to rent or purchase your online course on a video-by-video basis. When purchasing a video, users will enjoy unlimited streaming of the lesson they’ve purchased, so that they can go back and rewatch the content at all times.

What is accessible elearning?

Accessible eLearning ensures that all learners have a barrier-free opportunity to participate in web-based learning activities. While accommodating the needs of people with disabilities in online learning environments, it also serves as a best practice for creating and developing learning opportunities that are accessible to everyone.

What is the most significant barrier to online access?

It includes conditions ranging from simple nearsightedness or farsightedness, to age-related difficulties, to a variety of color-blind conditions, to complete loss of sight. Individuals with a vision impairment often face the most significant barriers in accessing online content, given its visual nature.

How to accommodate learners with visual impairment?

An easy way to accommodate learners with a visual impairment is to add zoom features. Having the option to simply increase the text size to make the text or screen more readable may be enough to meet the learner’s needs. Potential barriers can result when content is not resizable or you can’t change the screen size. 2.

Why are there barriers in a document?

Barriers are created when correct heading elements have not been used to structure content and when link text is not meaningful on its own (e.g., “click here” provides no useful information). Additionally, drop-down menus should be avoided, as screen readers will only interpret them as one object.

Can hearing loss be a barrier to online learning?

Learners with hearing loss will typically experience fewer barriers in accessing online content than people with vision impairments, though multimedia and audio content will obviously present barriers if alternatives such as captions or transcripts are not provided. YouTube, for example, allows users to produce text from a video’s audio track. If you have included a video in your course, you may want to consider uploading it to YouTube to take advantage of this feature. Alternatively, if your course includes audio or narration, you can include closed captioning or provide learners with a downloadable handout of the transcript.

Is online learning accessible to people with disabilities?

An online course environment should not pose a barrier to learning, however with widespread adoption of online learning, many online courses are simply not accessible for people with disabilities.

Is interactivity good for eLearning?

According to Christopher Pappas, “while eLearning interactivity is a great way to engage your learners, you should try to avoid complex interactions when developing accessible eLearning material. Learners with poor motor skills will not appreciate, for instance, intense drag and drop interactions, so you need to find alternative ways to design your interactive elements, making them a simple as possible”.

Legal Requirements For Online Course Accessibility

Basic Guidelines For Developing Accessible Courses

• There are some basic things to know when you’re designing accessible online courses. You need to use image descriptions and alt-textfor all your images and videos, add captions and/or transcripts to videos, and make sure all PDFs have been run through optical character recognition (OCR). Using alt-text and alt-tags makes it possible for screen read...

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The Importance of Layouts and Structure

Creating Options For Content

Small Elements Make A Big Difference

Use Accessible Forms

What Kinds of Challenges Are We Talking About?

Barriers

Accessibility

Keep The Learners in Mind

• It is most important thatlearners can access the material, so understanding the learners and thinkingabout potential barriers is key. Making this your focus will change yourthought processes and allow you to avoid potential accessibility issues fromthe start, saving time and improving the quality of your work. Through thesefive steps, you can move ...

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Resources For Further Information