Accessible Slides
Engaging and accessible presentation slides will include short clear text and supporting images. Whenever possible, try to share your slides with students prior to a synchronous session or as an additional resource for recorded lectures. This lets students easily take notes and review the slides at their own pace. The following are components of accessible slides. You can create accessible slides with either Microsoft PowerPoint or Google Slides.
Installing Office 365
All faculty at STCC can install Microsoft Office 365 applications for free. The most up to date software will give you access to the best accessibility features, so if you don't already have the most recent version of Microsoft Word installed, follow the instructions to download and install Office.
You can also login with your STCC credentials into the browser based version of Office 365.
Slides Considerations
Clear formatting and organization
While you are creating your slides, remember less is often more. Aim for clear, concise slides with a standard layout to present information to students. Consistent formatting and structure will make it easier for students who have cognitive disabilities to absorb and understand information. Avoid unnecessary text and images, and large blocks of text.
Images and graphics
Alternative, or Alt text, is presented to someone using a screen reader, and allows them to hear a description of an image or is displayed on the screen if the image fails to load due to a slow connection or other technical difficulty. Alt text should be kept short, but informative, so that students who cannot see an image can still understand the information it conveys. Alt text is context specific and relates to the meaning that the image presents in your specific course. Alternative text for graphics, such as cartoons or charts, need to include any text presented in the graphic while describing the overall meaning. In designing slides, try to avoid structural elements like divider lines that may be perceived as an image or make sure to mark them as decorative. To make slide text easy to read, avoid watermarks or background images.
Color and contrast
High contrasts in colors makes them easy to see and read for everyone. Black text on a white background is the most common. If you plan on adding colors through changing backgrounds or using highlighter colors, make sure they do not obscure or make the text hard to read, such as yellow text on a green highlight. If you are using colors in graphs or diagrams incorporate texture or patterns so that color is not the only way to convey information, and check for color contrast.
Font
For presentations, using a simple sans-serif font set to 24pt or larger will ensure your slide is easy to read for you students, including those on small devices and those students who are low-vision.
Slide structure
Notes
Slide notes record the information that you would say verbally during a presentation. Including slide notes helps students review content and read through material they may not be able to hear.
Titles
Slide titles help students navigate through the presentation or review a relevant slide to prepare for an assessment. Each slide in a presentation should have a unique title. If there are multiple slides on the same topic, name them part 1, part 2 etc. Slide titles can be pulled off the main visual display of the slide if you need the space for a large graphic. In Microsoft PowerPoint, you can also control the visibility of slide elements in the selection pane.
Layouts and reading order
Just like heading styles create document hierarchy, slide layouts allow for ease of navigation in slides. By using preset slide layout, you can ensure that all slides come with a title and the slide components are read out in a logical order to those using a screen reader. You should always check the reading order of your slides. As you tab through a slide, elements will be highlighted in the order that they would be read. In PowerPoint, slide elements displayed in the selection pane will be read from bottom to top. Thus, the title should always be the bottom-most element so that it is read out first, followed by primary text content, other text boxes, and images.
To change Google Slides reading order: click on Arrange menu > Order. Send backward will raise the element to a higher reading order. Bring forward will make the element lower in the reading order. Tab through the elements to test.
Bullets and numbering
Bullets and numbering help to organize slide text into structured lists. Use bullets for lists without a sequential order such as several ideas on the same topic. Use numbering for ordered lists like the steps in a chemical reaction.
Checking for Accessibility
You have followed all of the best practices, check to see if any adjustments are needed. Microsoft PowerPoint has a built in accessibility checker and Google Slides offers and add-on. While the checkers are automated algorithms that will make mistakes, they are a good first pass to check for errors.
Sharing documents with students
Before sharing any files with students, make sure that the file has a unique and descriptive file name. Remember, when students download files that you added to Blackboard, the file name will be the same as it was when you initially uploaded it. Make it easy for students to find and open the correct document when they search for the file on their computers.
There are many components to a Microsoft PowerPoint slide presentation and they do not convert well to PDF. Share accessible slide presentations as PowerPoint files.
Google Slide presentations can be shared as a link with sharing permission set to Viewer.