Blind and Visually Impaired Community
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I'm making a website for a VI high school student (self.Blind)
submitted by VI_Geo_Quiz
Hello r/Blind! I'm an employee at a high school, and I am trying to help a VI student access their geography quizzes. While they still have some sight, they are legally blind, so trying to read a copy of a copy of a workbook map is obviously not feasible for them. In an attempt to make the quizzes accessible, I made an html file for a few of the quizzes and hosted it on GitHub Pages at $1. Currently, there are three links: the 1st quiz of the course, the "quiz mode" of the current quiz, and the "study mode" of the current quiz.
I showed the site to them, and they liked it, but I would like to ask those of you with some limited sight for your opinion on the quiz pages. Before now, we have just been using large printouts of the quizzes, so making the change to a digital format is new to us. Are there features that would make using the pages easier for them?
Currently, the features of the pages are fairly simple. Pressing A through J will select a location and change the map image to one that highlights the associated location. Pressing 1 through 9 and 0 will select a question from 1 to 10. Beneath the map image, the text from the quiz will appear after "Selected Question", and my description of the location will appear after "Selected Location". The text is made accessible by their screen reader. The final input is pressing the Enter key; it will pair the selected question with the selected location. With the study mode page, the word "Correct!" appears after pressing enter with a correct pairing.
Are there other things that I could do to make this easier for them to use? I am only a beginner at web design, but I'm pretty good at googling what I need to know.
Thank you for your time!
I showed the site to them, and they liked it, but I would like to ask those of you with some limited sight for your opinion on the quiz pages. Before now, we have just been using large printouts of the quizzes, so making the change to a digital format is new to us. Are there features that would make using the pages easier for them?
Currently, the features of the pages are fairly simple. Pressing A through J will select a location and change the map image to one that highlights the associated location. Pressing 1 through 9 and 0 will select a question from 1 to 10. Beneath the map image, the text from the quiz will appear after "Selected Question", and my description of the location will appear after "Selected Location". The text is made accessible by their screen reader. The final input is pressing the Enter key; it will pair the selected question with the selected location. With the study mode page, the word "Correct!" appears after pressing enter with a correct pairing.
Are there other things that I could do to make this easier for them to use? I am only a beginner at web design, but I'm pretty good at googling what I need to know.
Thank you for your time!
Fange_Strellow 2 points 2y ago
I’m not sure I have any advice on your specific question, however I did want to commend you on taking interest in helping the student and for already doing so much by creating a website and doing your best to understand what it would take to help translate the material to the student. There are a lot of teachers and a lot of schools that Let blind children and children with other disabilities simply fall through the cracks, or be relegated to subpar education’s in a special education classroom
VI_Geo_Quiz [OP] 1 points 2y ago
Thank you!
CloudyBeep 2 points 2y ago
This should really be the job of the student's Teacher of the Visually Impaired. Does the student have one, and if so, why are they not doing the job they're being paid to do? If they don't have one, the school could be sued because it's a legal requirement.
Anyway, there are some best practices for making print legible. I quite like these guidelines from Australia: http://printdisability.org/guidelines/guidelines-for-producing-clear-print-2011/ And here are some design considerations for web content for people withlow vision: https://www.w3.org/TR/low-vision-needs/
Anyway, there are some best practices for making print legible. I quite like these guidelines from Australia: http://printdisability.org/guidelines/guidelines-for-producing-clear-print-2011/ And here are some design considerations for web content for people withlow vision: https://www.w3.org/TR/low-vision-needs/
Fange_Strellow 3 points 2y ago
I am just curious, what would this teacher do in this situation? I ask, because I went through school without requesting or looking into any of the services, as I hit my visual impairment for as long as possible to my teachers. I can’t imagine every single school in the United States could staff a teacher with such a specific skill set so I’m wondering how remote school districts will acquire this type of service
CloudyBeep 2 points 2y ago
The teacher would have students at several neighboring schools. Some schools also have paraprofessionals who can help with this.
Accessible textbooks can be requested through statewide quotas that go to companies like American Printing House for the Blind, so the TVI would only need to make class handouts accessible.
Accessible textbooks can be requested through statewide quotas that go to companies like American Printing House for the Blind, so the TVI would only need to make class handouts accessible.
TheBlindBookLover 2 points 2y ago
There is usually a VI team of VI teachers assigned to a school district or county. Some VI teachers can assist students remotely too.
VI_Geo_Quiz [OP] 2 points 2y ago
I am one of the members of the VI team. For everything else in this student’s coursework, we have tools and procedures that work.
The geography quizzes are just a new type of assignment that we have not dealt with very much. When the student last had these types of assignments, several years ago, the way the VI team made it accessible was to print enlarged portions of the map on separate pages and then tape them together. Then each location would be colored with colored pencils.
This is what we have used so far, but it creates a lot of paper for the student to keep track of, and sometimes the locations are small and/or overlap. That’s one of the perks that this site idea has; pressing the keys a through j will change the map image to one that only highlights the location associated with that key.
The geography quizzes are just a new type of assignment that we have not dealt with very much. When the student last had these types of assignments, several years ago, the way the VI team made it accessible was to print enlarged portions of the map on separate pages and then tape them together. Then each location would be colored with colored pencils.
This is what we have used so far, but it creates a lot of paper for the student to keep track of, and sometimes the locations are small and/or overlap. That’s one of the perks that this site idea has; pressing the keys a through j will change the map image to one that only highlights the location associated with that key.
BlueRock956 1 points 2y ago
What on-line platform is the school using for the rest of the students? We may save you a bit of effort if we can determine if the platform is accessible with the screen reader or magnification software that your student is using.
VI_Geo_Quiz [OP] 1 points 2y ago
The online coursework is through Canvas, but these geography quizzes are being given as physical papers in class.
Canvas is it’s own issue for accessibility, but this site is just me trying to take an in-class assignment that is very visually-dependent and make it less so.
As for the software my student is using, they are using a mix of Windows 10’s features, Read&Write, and others for more specific uses.
Canvas is it’s own issue for accessibility, but this site is just me trying to take an in-class assignment that is very visually-dependent and make it less so.
As for the software my student is using, they are using a mix of Windows 10’s features, Read&Write, and others for more specific uses.
BlueRock956 1 points 2y ago
Creating a Google form may be easier than what you are doing... And a word document would have been accessible for the student.
Its great that you are trying to help, but I don't know how long you'd be able to continue providing materials in this format while not falling behind the course work.
Its great that you are trying to help, but I don't know how long you'd be able to continue providing materials in this format while not falling behind the course work.
VI_Geo_Quiz [OP] 1 points 2y ago
With Forms and Word Docs, my student would have access to the documents, but there would be some want for features. With this site, I’ve added images that highlight each location when its associated key is pressed, and I think that adding those to one document would make for a lot of pages that they would need to search through. With this website, the images are all in the same place.
As for the longevity of this idea, once I have the foundation for these quizzes made, adapting it for each new quiz is pretty simple to do.
As for the longevity of this idea, once I have the foundation for these quizzes made, adapting it for each new quiz is pretty simple to do.
BlueRock956 1 points 2y ago
It sounds great then.
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