Accessibility

Why consider accessibility?

Considering accessibility in teaching and learning activities is crucial for several reasons:

• Inclusive Education: Accessibility ensures that all students, regardless of disability or learning difference, have equal opportunities to participate and succeed. It helps create an inclusive learning environment where everyone feels valued and can engage fully.

• Legal and Ethical Obligations: Many countries, including the UK, have laws like the Equality Act 2010 that mandate institutions to make reasonable adjustments for students with disabilities. Ensuring your teaching is accessible helps fulfil these legal responsibilities.

• Enhanced Learning for All: Accessible teaching benefits not just students with disabilities but all learners. For example, captions on videos are helpful for students who are non-native speakers, while clear, structured materials aid understanding for everyone.

• Diverse Learners: Students come with diverse needs, backgrounds, and learning preferences. Accessibility practices, such as offering materials in multiple formats, help accommodate this diversity, leading to a richer learning experience.

• Improved Student Retention and Success: When barriers to learning are reduced, students are more likely to engage, succeed, and persist in their studies. This can positively impact student retention rates and academic outcomes.

• Universal Design for Learning (UDL): Accessibility principles often align with UDL, which encourages flexible ways of presenting information, engaging students, and assessing their learning. UDL fosters a more adaptable and personalised approach to education.

Prioritising accessibility demonstrates a commitment to equity, supports diverse learners, and ultimately leads to better educational outcomes for all students.

How can eLearning help?

The FBMH eLearning team can support you in significantly enhancing accessibility in your teaching, making education more inclusive and effective for all students. Here’s how:

• Guidance on Accessible Content Creation: The FBMH eLearning team offers training on creating accessible materials, such as ensuring alternative text for images, accessible documents, and captions for videos. We can provide clear guidelines for using proper headings, descriptive links, and accessible colour contrasts, ensuring your content can be navigated by all students, including those using screen readers.

• Support for Learning Platform Accessibility: We can help you design your courses on platforms like Blackboard or Canvas to be accessible, ensuring smooth navigation and accessible course resources. We can advise you on how to test your course materials with assistive technologies, such as screen readers, to identify and remove barriers for students with disabilities.

• Accessible Learning Technologies: We demonstrate how the digital or online learning tools that we support can support accessibility.

• Universal Design for Learning (UDL) Consultation: We can guide you through implementing UDL principles to offer diverse ways of presenting information, engaging students, and assessing their learning to accommodate different needs. We can work with you to adapt teaching approaches, such as offering materials in multiple formats (audio, video, text), dual-mode delivery, or flexible assignment options.

• Reviewing and Remediating Existing Materials: The FBMH eLearning team can audit your course materials to identify how you might be able to resolve accessibility issues, such as reformatting PDFs or adding alt text to images. We provide advice and guidance on fixing accessibility issues, such as editing documents or adjusting course layouts to meet accessibility standards.

• Inclusive Assessment Practices: We assist in designing assessments that accommodate diverse learning needs, including offering flexible assessment formats or extended time. We ensure that assessment platforms are accessible, supporting features like screen reader compatibility and keyboard navigation.

• Staying Updated on Accessibility Standards: eLearning professionals can keep you informed of accessibility standards like WCAG 2.1 and legal requirements such as the Public Sector Bodies Accessibility Regulations 2018, ensuring your materials meet institutional and legal expectations. We work with the Association for Learning Technology and Jisc.

• Fostering a Culture of Accessibility: We regularly promote accessibility in teaching, encouraging a proactive approach during course design to create inclusive learning environments. We work closely with institutional accessibility champions to drive continuous improvements, ensuring that accessibility becomes embedded in your teaching practice.

By partnering with FBMH eLearning, you can create accessible, engaging, and inclusive courses that benefit all students.

Want to learn more?

On this page, you’ll find a variety of materials and links to resources that can help you enhance the accessibility of your teaching. These include guides on creating accessible content, tips for using learning platforms, and links to useful tools and software. You can also explore best practices for inclusive course design, as well as recommendations for integrating accessible technologies into your teaching. Simply browse the sections below and select the appropriate button to access the support you need to make your learning materials more inclusive and effective for all students.