Disabilities

After storyboarding Learning Module activities revaluate them to make sure all activities are accessible to students with disabilities.

What is Accessibility?

With web sites, the term traditionally refers to the development of sites that are accessible to "all" users who may want to access them. http://www.mtsu.edu/~sdennis/accessibility/index.htm

Even though the World Wide Web is continuously growing, many users:

use speech browsers or eyes busy/hands busy, as businessmen in cars;
don't have the latest graphical browsers and plug-ins;
surf with slow modems, or reside in rural or remote areas with limited access to the Internet;
browse without graphics, using text-only browsers or subscribe to non-graphic services;
access in noisy, high- or low-light environments;

Other students may have disabilities. The Americans with Disabilities Act (1990) List of Disabilities categories includes;

Sensory Disabilities (visual, hearing)
Communication Disorders (speech impairments)
Cognitive Disabilities (mental retardation, TBI)
Physical Disabilities (cerebral palsy, multiple sclerosis)
Chronic Health Disorders (cardiac, pulmonary)
Impaired Mental Health (depression, schizophrenia)
Chemical Dependence

Making the Web more accessible for users with various disabilities is to a great extent a matter of using HTML the way it was intended: to encode meaning rather than appearance. As long as a page is coded for meaning, it is possible for alternative browsers to present that meaning in ways that are optimized for the abilities of individual users and thus facilitate the use of the Web by disabled users.

For more information about working with students and faculty with disabilities check out the MTSU Americans with Disabilities Act Compliance web site http://www.mtsu.edu/~pvpaa/ada/

Assignment #4

Evaluate each of your course activities for accessibility issues. Make a plan for resolving these issues.
Read through each of the appendices; 10 Tips for Online Teaching Success and Software.
Download and install MTSU eLearning site license software and install on you computer. (PC users only.)

>> Next: Appendix 1