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Designing an Accessible Course

1. Course Structure and Content Clarity

   • Logical Structure: Organize course sections, modules, and assignments clearly so that navigation on the course page is easy. Use descriptive titles for headings and activities.
   • Readable Text: Avoid long blocks of text and excessive formatting (e.g., all caps, underlining, or italics).

2. Technical Accessibility of Text

   • Headings: Use formatted heading styles (e.g., H1, H2, H3) to create structure. These help screen readers and other assistive technologies interpret content correctly. Do not skip heading levels (e.g., jumping from H1 to H3), and avoid manually creating headings by changing font size or bolding text.
   • Links: Use descriptive link text instead of just URLs. Avoid vague phrases like “click here.” The purpose of the link should be clear from the link text alone.

3. Image Accessibility

   • Alt Text: Add alternative text to images that describes the content and purpose of the image. If the image is decorative, mark it as such. To add alt text in the MyCourses platform:
     • Click the “Add Image” icon.
     • Select the image file in the file browser window.
     • Add alternative text in the field “Describe this image to someone who cannot see it,” or mark the image as decorative. Save changes.

4. Video and Audio Content

   • Captions: Add captions to all videos. They support deaf and hard-of-hearing students, as well as others. Panopto automatically generates captions. You can edit the captions afterwards. Read more about. Provide a text-based alternative description of the video content if captions are not available.

5. Colors and Contrast

   • Contrast: Use color combinations with sufficient contrast, such as black text on a white background.
   • Check Contrast: You can check color contrast using the WebAIM Contrast Checker.
   • Color as Information: Do not rely solely on color to convey information. Use shapes, patterns, or headings to improve readability.

6. Accessible Documents

   • Ensure that all Word, PowerPoint, and PDF files are accessible before publishing.

Accessible learning material

Accessibility tool 

The accessibility tool provides information about the accessibility of your course area. The tool’s analysis shows which parts of the course area are problematic in terms of accessibility

Enabling the accessibility tool in a MyCourses workspace

1. Open the course workspace and turn editing on.
2. In the right-hand menu, open Blocks.
3. In Add a block, select Accessibility review.
4. The block will appear in the right-hand menu.
5. Start the accessibility analysis by clicking the Submit for analysis button. You will see the notification:
   This course has been scheduled for analysis. It will take a few minutes to complete. You do not need to stay on this page while waiting for the results. Students cannot see the results.
6. Once the review has been completed, you can update the course structure and content based on the accessibility results. The accessibility review is updated automatically. You do not need to refresh or remove it.

Interpreting the results

When the review is complete, you can a summary of the results in the block. More detailed error list can be opened from the magnifying glass button (Icon no. 1 in picture below). The error list includes direct links to edit each activity. You may also view result in different ways:

• Results based on activies and content types: The charts are available via the magnifying glass button (Icon no. 1 in picture below)
• A heatmap that shows in which course sections there are accessibility issues. You can show or hide the map using the eye button (Icon no. 2 in picture below) in the block
• A PDF summary of accessibility issues. Download the summary using the download button (Icon no. 3 in picture below)

Typical errors and how to fix them

Read more:

Readspeaker for reading websites

ReadSpeaker is a service that has multiple products to help users read online content. WebReader is a tool to help user when reading text from screen. DocReader is tool for reading documents.

ReadSpeaker tools are service based so you can find WebReader or DocReader in some Aalto services but not all of them. This page is about ReadSpeaker services in MyCourses service.

How to activate ReadsSpeaker, WebReader and DocReader MyCourses course space?

ReadSpeaker is not activated by default in your course page. Teacher needs to activate it for students in course spaces. When activated, it will activate both Webreader and DocReader. Aalto licence includes three languages: English, Finnish and Swedish. Teacher can select one as a default language for course but user can change reading language when using system. If language is not selected default will be English. User can change reader language when using WebReader of DocReader.

Activate player on course space

1. Go to course space and turn editing on.
2. Open right side menu and select Add a block.
3. From pop up menu select ReadSpeaker webReader.
4. Now you can see ReadSpeaker player on the right side of the page.
5. ReadSpeaker is now active on you page.

Configure ReacSpeaker

1. open configuration from three dots and select Configurate listen to this page using ReadSpeaker block
2. Set the language EN, FI, SV
3. Set the Dosplay on page types to Any type this means than block will be shown on any page on course.
4. Save changes.

More about: 

Using ReadSpeaker for Content Reading

There are few different ways you can use reader when course space: 

1. If you just click play button reader tries to read page content. It does not read everything on page but it tries to find page content text.
2. You can select text on page or if activate user can hover on page element to select readable content. After selection you will see menu where you can listen selected text. There is also Dictionary and Translation available (uses google translation)
3. If teacher upload a text file (.odp .ods. odt .xls .xlxs .pps .ppt .pptx .doc .docx .rtf .epub .pdf) to MyCourses as a resource ReadSpeaker provides online service where user can use multiple tool to read the file content. User can open document in online service by clicking ReadSpeaker icon (see image below) instead of document name. Icon will be added automatically to resource activities when ReadSpeaker block is added to course space.