Instructional Design and Accessibility

Accessibility Trainings: The Great and Terrible

Some trainings on accessibility are great; they provide a solid definition for what accessibility means, and give actionable guidance on how to increase access. Some accessibility trainings are…not so great.

I recently found a good one. It’s called Accessible Teaching Basics, it’s through Moodle Academy, and it’s free. (Moodle is an international and free learning management system that’s used outside of traditional academia. It’s what we use in my current job.)

Two Things I appreciated:

Social vs. Medical Model of Disability

The course creators quote from a UK-Based Advocacy organization (Scope) for their definitions here. Essentially:

Social Model of Disability: created by disabled people, puts the focus on the things being accessed. It’s the barriers to access that are the problem, not the disabled person.

Medical Model of Disability: created by medical community, puts the focus on the person’s disability. Rightly criticized as a model that “looks at what is ‘wrong’ with the person, not what the person needs.”

Emphasis on Universal Design

Said (overly) simply: if you design your course in a way that gives students options and control, your students will be more successful. Pragmatic examples: give students an option to have subtitles or not. Give the PowerPoint slides out ahead of time. Provide recordings of the lecture with a transcript available. You’re giving a lot of ways to access the information. This is good for everyone.