Web accessibility is something that is often times overlooked when working with digital media, so today we had the opportunity to incorporate some accessibility elements into our own Word Press websites. We first went over what accessibility means, and it can vary among different types of people. But in general, making things more accessible is adding or adjusting elements so that people with disabilities (hearing, sight, movement, learning, etc.) can still use and enjoy them.
When specifically talking about web accessibility, one of the disabilities that comes to mind is visual impairments. We learned that people who are visually impaired can still access websites through web-readers, which are text-to-speech software that narrate the words from the screen to the user. Web-readers can also describe pictures, but only if alt-text is available for said pictures. I learned that it is important to have concise and descriptive alt-text, otherwise it adds no context to the image. See the picture I have below.
In this image, I have given the alt-text of “My small, black & white dog, Obi, standing on a rock surrounded by greenery.” But what if “dog” was the only descriptor in the alt-text? Doing something like that does not help someone using assistive technology as it provides no context to what the image on screen is. Adding alt-text is simple enough that I think it should be done to every image to help with accessibility.
Another element of web accessibility that helps people who are hearing impaired is closed captions or subtitles for videos. I’ve included the screen cast video that I posted last week below, but this time it has closed captions to make it more accessible.
The closed captions in the above video were auto-generated on YouTube, however they were not 100% accurate in its initial generation, so I had to make some manual edits. Regardless, I think that having A.I. generate closed captions for videos immensely helps with accessibility and is something that I often see is overlooked. I am a person who prefers to have subtitles when watching videos, so I notice whether they are there or not. I have often times found myself watching a video either in class or on my own and there will be no option to even have closed captions. This case is becoming increasingly rare as many YouTube videos have the auto generated captions, but is still something that can be improved upon, especially in the department of foreign languages. Schools are becoming increasingly diverse and language barriers do exist. I’ve often seen students who do not speak English struggle, not because they are not intelligent, but because they cannot communicate and receive ideas as well as other students who are native English speakers. I think that including closed captions of multiple languages can benefit those students and help them to take in learning content better.
Hi Matt,
I really enjoyed your post on Web accessibility and inclusivity, thanks for sharing! I appreciate that you mentioned how to properly integrate alt-text into an article and that you provided a fantastic example to clarify. By including specific details about a given image while still remaining concise, users can better visualize what is happening in the image. General statements, such as “dog”, provide no context and, therefore, makes the image quite irrelevant to the text. Without providing detail, the image would otherwise serve no purpose. I also love your dog’s name by the way, great ode to Obi-Wan!
Moreover, I love that you noted the importance of closed captions for ELL students. Closed captions provide a visual and textual representation of spoken language to improve comprehension, increase vocabulary, improve pronunciation, and increase accessibility. This reminded me of my uncle who goes on yearly trips to Nicaragua with his students at Dawson College to complete community projects (e.g. building roads, painting local schools and health clinics). He mentioned to me once that the family he stayed with in Nicaragua had learned to speak English exclusively from watching English TV shows with closed captions, which I think is so cool!