This post presents a 15-minute mini-lecture on accessibility, designed to be useful for anyone creating websites or online resources, including virtual learning environments. The lecture is not exhaustive, but introduces some of the considerations about disabled users’ experiences of the web and how you can create accessible web resources. Full accessibility guidance, including further advice on formatting (for example avoiding underlining text that isn’t a link or mis-using italics with blocks of text) is available through the links at the bottom of the post.
Further resources
Policies
- WCAG 2.0 guidelines – Widely cited and include detailed practical approaches to accessibility.
- Section 508 standards – USA IT accessibility legislation and practical guidance.
- Equality Act 2010 – UK legislation which accessibility cases may draw upon.
Advice for content authors
- Accessibility Training – A self-paced tutorial website which goes through accessibility in more detail, written by experts at the University of Southampton.
- JISC TechDis Web Accessibility – Excellent practical advice, clearly worded and presented. Advice for making documents (Word, PDF) accessible is also available.
- Principles for Accessible Design – WebAIM’s guidance for developing web resources.
- Describing Images – Standford University guidance on how to write image descriptions.
- Bad Practices for Dyslexic Users – Summary of some common problems that affect people with dyslexia.
- Dyslexia Style Guide – British Dyslexia Association guidance on accessible practice for dyslexic students.
- Colour Blindness – Examples of how colour blindness affects interpretation of images.
- Web2Access – Tested a number of web tools and platforms, unfortunately now out of date, but the testing processes may be useful for your own site.
Understanding how disabled users interact with content
- Screen-reader users: the importance of headings and descriptive links
Tools for content authors
- Colour Contrast Checker – WebAIM’s checker allows you to measure your colour combinations against the WCAG guidelines.
- Color Oracle – Colour blindness simulation tool.
- Dyslexia Simulation – WebAIM’s tutorial on dyslexia showing examples of how text may be manifested. Requires Flash (may not work on tablets).
Tools for disabled users
- Access Tools – Free USB-drive friendly software for accessibility.
- Reading on Screen – Website with a number of assistive technologies linked and accessibility tweaks applicable to all users.