- From: Daniel Montalvo Charameli <dmontalvo@w3.org>
- Date: Tue, 6 Aug 2019 18:20:34 +0200
- To: Helen Burge <helen.burge@deque.com>, wai-eo-editors@w3.org
hello Helen. Many thanks for your comments and feedback. They are very welcomed. Let me address your comments below. On 8/2/2019 3:40 PM, Helen Burge wrote: Hi, I was added to the group but not allowed to submit my answers so here they are: 1) No comment 2) I read the material carefully . 3. Unit 1: What is Web Accessibility: "Describe the scope of “the Web” beyond desktop and mobile devices" - this should be expanded on as does it mean expanding on assistive technology? I was not thinking of assistive technologies yet. These will be addressed later on in the unit. At this point the main goal for this learning outcome is that students are aware that the web expands into many other devises different than the PC and their phone, such as smart watches, TVs, or smart home devices. I have reworded this learning outcome and now it says: > * Describe how “the Web” expands into other devices such as smart TVs, watches, or smart home appliances Is it clearer now? 4. Topic: Stories of people with Disabilities: Will there be links to resources to get demonstrators or is it best to say "Tip: As you may be inviting only one or two demonstrators (colleagues or friends) of assistive technology," - as the term demonstrator is not clear it is someone with a disability, so could be a user? I think specifically of "expert users with disabilities". We have reached a consensus to require expert users to explain how an assistive technology works, since having any type of user might lead students to confusion. It seems to me like there is a wording issue and I need to change the word "demonstrator" to something else. Maybe > * Invite expert users with disabilities to demonstrate the assistive technologies and adaptive strategies they use when interacting with websites and applications. Ask users to explain some accessibility features. Encourage them to present some frequently encountered barriers and strategies they use to work around them. > **Tip:** As you may be inviting only one or two users, make sure to emphasize the diversity among people with disabilities, even with the same type of disability. Also emphasize how design features can enable or disable people. ... Is it clearer now? To expand on the current suggestions, I have found highlighting examples relevant to the audience of good and bad practices that the audience can relate to. For instance their product and what they currently do well for screen readers and what they can improve on. I also have given more relevant homework where I give a scenario in a typical user experience. Like "Using a screen reader, go to x website and search for a red item. Add it to your basket and open the checkout." I would give a scenario as often would highlight areas the audience assume work in their product. The examples given in the training are quite relevant to the homework and you can suggest a review session to go through what the audience found hard or easy and how much is down to not understanding to use the tools versus design of the website. I feel the course does cover this, but is assuming the trainer will have advanced users of assistive technology in the class and in some cases this will not be possible and these are suggestions that can help the trainer with practical methods of helping a learner. I didn't raise a ticket as feel this feedback is quite subjective and might be overkill! I will work on trying to be more directive in the "Teaching Ideas" and the "Homework Ideas" for the curricula. It is important to bear in mind, though, that at this stage we are developing a curriculum, from which organisms will hopefully develop their own courses. There is also a project for which a MOOC course based on this curriculum will be developed. Further materials to guide teachers on how to develop a specific activity are to be developed in the future, with founds from the WAI-Guide project as well. So I think we need to strike the balance here between guide trainers who have not a very deep knowledge in the matter but at the same time leave room for the future materials of this resource that are to come. 5. Topic: Scope of Web Accessibility: "Explain that accessibility is part of overall inclusion, since accessibility features benefit all users as well as those with disabilities." a good example here is contrast ratios, as "normal" users can read strong ratios better than weak ratios and most audiences can relate. (Also mentioned in a subsequent point). Again a homework idea could be a real life example exercise of the student using assistive technology online to perform a task they are used to doing frequently like online shopping. In unit 2 we have some of these exercises you are proposing. > * Ask students to explore the use of assistive technologies to perform a task, such as reading the news, making a purchase, interacting in social networks, etc. Instruct them that their experiences are not those of an assistive technology everyday user. > * Ask students to go to three different types of websites (e.g., shopping site, banking site, entertainment site) and to identify three access barriers from each of the three sites. Ask students to creatively explain how better design may remove those barriers found. Once again I am hesitant to write very concrete activities in the curricula, since I feel these will be addressed in complementary resources we are to develop. The curricula is intended to be a framework for many types of audiences that will later develop their own training activities. You can have a look at the Curricula Requirements Analysis if you want to get familiar with the background for this resource. 6. Unit 2: People and Digital Technology: I agree with the format and content 7. Topic: Diverse Abilities, Tools, and Strategies: "Ask students to engage with relatives, friends, or colleagues with disabilities that they may have." - is it better to say "Ask students to engage with relatives, friends, or colleagues with difficulties that they may have with web content." - mainly as asking my mum "what disabilities do you have?" might get me slapped! Oh, mine would probably say "I don't have any disabilities" :-) but... anyway, I guess broadening the scope a little bit will help since we can reinforce the idea that accessibility features benefit users without disabilities as well. This is an idea that will be later developed, specially in the business case for accessibility unit. I have reworded it as follows: > * Ask students to engage with relatives, friends, or colleagues that they may have. Ask students to gather information on which types of assistive tools and/or adaptive strategies their acquaintances use to interact with digital technology. Help students classify the tools they have learned about. Could the focus be less about disabilities and more about the need for assistive technology for simple tasks like the use of glasses when using real life examples. Might be worth adding to the tip that does cover this too. This is one of the most difficult balances to strike here. On the one hand I agree with you that we don't want to make this too disability-centered but, on the other, we do need to explain the concept of disability, the main types of disabilities that exist and also point to people with disabilities at a certain extent. Now the tip looks: > **Tip**: While it is important to introduce different types of disabilities, avoid portraying them as being limiting or discomfortable. Compare the role of assistive technologies and adaptive strategies with that of other tools used by people without disabilities, such as glasses. Communicate that barriers are caused by design decisions rather than by the disability. 8. Topic: Components of Web Accessibility: For teaching ideas is it worth adding some examples of known limitations of assistive technology versus websites. For example Android screen readers do not hide decorative images with alt="" unless the developer adds aria-hidden="true". Is the responsibility on the developer or on the assistive technology? Good point, really the concept of accessibility support keeps evolving day after day. I think I would not exaggerate if I say that every day things in the accessibility support field change for better or worse. I have added this but as a general idea, We need to think carefully before pointing to any specific instance of accessibility support, same rationale as per the other specifics. Now the first teaching idea of topic "Components of Web Accessibility" looks like: > * Based on the previously taught topics, ask students to reflect on the inter-dependencies between assistive technologies, adaptive strategies, and digital content. Guide them to realize how one relies on the other and how using different combinations of tools may yield different user experiences. 9) No other comments Regards, Helen Thanks again. Daniel. -- Helen Burge | Senior Accessibility Consultant | +44796-748-1296 Deque Systems - Accessibility for Good deque.com
Received on Tuesday, 6 August 2019 16:20:39 UTC