#43310
Speaker(s)
- Christopher Phillips, Associate Director, WebAIM
- George Joeckel, Online Training Program Manager, WebAIM
Session Details
- Length of Session: 1-hr
- Format: Lecture
- Expertise Level: All Levels
- Type of session: General Conference
Summary
WebAIM has offered an independent-study, fully online, video-based document accessibility course since 2018. In this session we will share best practices to consider when developing your own asynchronous online courses. We will also share practical tools and lessons learned in supporting learners with different levels of technical and accessibility experience.
Abstract
The WebAIM document accessibility course is an online, video-based course that provides a foundation for learners to create accessible source documents in Microsoft Office, PowerPoint, and Excel. It also covers using Adobe Acrobat Pro to optimize PDFs exported from accessible source documents. Course development started in 2016, and the course was launched in 2018. To date, over 20,000 professionals from different backgrounds and industries have participated in the course. We have recently updated the content and are excited to share lessons learned and instructional decisions made during that process.
In developing and updating the course we have spent significant time and effort to ensure it is both technically accessible and as easy-to-use as possible. We recognize that many course participants have competing priorities and have worked to make the course experience as intuitive, simple and straightforward as possible so the focus in on the instruction. When updating the content, we carefully reevaluated different parts of the experience (i.e. video length, timed delivery, and impact of assessment) to optimize the learning experience. We will walk through how those decisions were made and the impact they have had on learners.
Our presentation will also share our development framework and an approach that focuses first on principles of accessibility before demonstrating accessibility. When training on accessibility within a specific tool (i.e. Microsoft Word), there is always a balance in how much background knowledge of the tool is needed and we will share specific examples of how we handle that balance.
Keypoints
- Practical strategies to design effective, easy-to-use accessibility training.
- Learn a training framework that applies core accessibility principles in content creation tools.
- The impact of how small instructional design desicisions impact the learner experience.
Disability Areas
All Areas
Topic Areas
Accessible Course Design, Other, Teaching about Accessibility in Curriculum, Uncategorized
Speaker Bio(s)
Christopher Phillips
Christopher Phillips brings a unique, interdisciplinary perspective to digital accessibility, combining years of experience in special education, product management, and leading enterprise-level disability inclusion initiatives. Christopher works with organizations to embed accessibility into their culture and infrastructure through policy development, capacity building, and hands-on technical assistance. His commitment to accessibility is shaped by two brothers with Down syndrome who provide a regular reminder that the world is a better place when it is accessible for everyone. He brings his previous worked in special education, instructional design, web development and product management to accessibility work.
George Joeckel
George manages the online training program at WebAIM. He has a master’s degree in instructional psychology and technology, and over 20 years of teaching experience. He has developed online courses at Utah State University since 2008, and he joined the WebAIM team at the end of 2015. The Accessible Documents video-based course launched in July 2018, and over 20,000 participants have enrolled in this independent-study training. George also conducts pre-conference workshops and delivers presentations at national conferences.