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WAI: Strategies, guidelines, resources to make the Web accessible to people with disabilities

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      1. »Instructor Resources
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[ROUGH DRAFT] Integrating Web Accessibility in Courses

NOTE: This document is an unapproved draft and should not be referenced or quoted under any circumstances. @@changelog

An important aspect of high quality Web courses is making the Web accessible to people with disabilities. [or: An important aspect of high quality Web courses is including instruction on developing Web sites that are accessible to people with disabilities.] To help instructors integrate accessibility in Web courses, this page includes:

• Instructor Resources — lists WAI materials that you can use for lecture, activities, and student study
• Announcement — background that encourages instructors to include accessibility in their Web courses, which can be used for e-mails, newsletter articles, and such to tell others about this resource list

Instructor Resources

This section lists WAI materials that you can use for lectures, and documents that describe topics in Web accessibility.

@@ put jump down list @@

@@ the flip issue @@

Presentation Support Materials

• "Slides"
  • Overview of the Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) & Web accessibility
  • Components of Web Accessibility Tutorial
  • [some of WAI staff's old presentations@@]
• Graphics
  • Components graphics in Essential Components of Web Accessibility document and Components of Web Accessibility Tutorial
  • W3C Process stage icons in How WAI Develops Accessibility Guidelines through the W3C Process
• Handouts
  • Quick Tips is a business-card-sized reference card that lists 10 tips for making accessible Web sites.
  • @@ put this idea up front, more clearly@@ All WAI resources may be printed and distributed per the copyright permission at: http://www.w3.org/Consortium/Legal/2002/copyright-documents-20021231 See also: http://www.w3.org/Consortium/Legal/IPR-FAQ-20000620#Documents
    Specifically, make sure to include in the printout a reference with copyright notice, Version number &/or "Content last updated" date, and link to the original document. For example:
    Introduction to Web Accessibility, Version 2.0, September 2005. S.L. Henry, ed. Copyright © 2005 W3C, (MIT, ERCIM, Keio). http://www.w3.org/WAI/intro/accessibility
    

Concepts | Topics "Readings"

• Basics of Web Accessibility
  • Introduction to Web Accessibility briefly introduces Web accessibility and links to additional resources.
  • How People with Disabilities Use the Web describes how different disabilities affect Web use and accessibility requirements for people with different kinds of disabilities, and includes scenarios of people with disabilities using the Web.
• Components of Web Accessibility
  • Essential Components of Web Accessibility document shows how Web accessibility depends on several components of Web development and interaction working together—including web content, authoring tools, evaluation tools, browsers and other user agents, and assistive technologies used by people with disabilities—and shows the relationship between the WAI guidelines: Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG), Authoring Tool Accessibility Guidelines (ATAG), and User Agent Accessibility Guidelines (UAAG).
  • Slides and images listed in the "Presentation Materials" section above
• Importance of Web Accessibility
  • For all: Social Factors addresses the role of Web accessibility in equal opportunity for people with disabilities; the overlap with digital divide issues; and benefits to people without disabilities, including older people, people with low literacy and people not fluent in the language, people with low bandwidth connections to the Internet and older technologies, and new and infrequent Web users.
  • For technical courses: Technical Factors addresses interoperability, quality, reducing site development and maintenance time, reducing server load, enabling content on different configurations, and being prepared for advanced Web technologies.
  • From a business perspective: Developing a Web Accessibility Business Case for Your Organization presents benefits and costs of Web accessibility and includes guidance on incorporating these aspects into a specific organization's business case, with separate pages for Social Factors, Technical Factors, Financial Factors, and Legal & Policy Factors.
• How to Develop Accessible Web Sites
  • Quick Tips lists the 10 quick tips and includes an order form for the business-card-sized reference card.
  • WCAG Overview addresses the information in a Web site, including text, images, forms, sounds, and such.
    • Overview of WCAG 2.0 Documents is an overview of the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0 Working Draft documents, and highlights how WCAG 2.0 working drafts differ from WCAG 1.0.
  • Improving the Accessibility of Your Web Site provides guidance for fixing accessibility barriers in existing Web sites—in other words, repairing accessibility problems, or retrofitting a site to improve accessibility—and provides approaches and tips for: getting started understanding the issues; developing a retrofitting plan by identifying accessibility barriers and prioritizing repairs; and repairing accessibility barriers on a site efficiently and effectively.
• Evaluating Web Accessibility
  • Evaluating Web Accessibility Resource Suite is a multi-page resource suite that outlines different approaches for evaluating Web sites for accessibility, providing general procedures and tips for evaluation in different situations, from evaluation during Web site development to ongoing monitoring of existing sites.

Additional Resources and Updated Material

Additional material from WAI is listed in WAI Resources. Many other organizations provide Web accessibility resources that can be found through search engines.

We may add more information to this Web page in the future. If you have suggestions of additional information that would help you include accessibility in your Web courses, please send them to xyz@w3.org, and we'll add them to our queue for later consideration. If you would like to be notified of updates to "Integrating Web Accessibility in Courses", subscribe to the XYZ e-mailing list by sending an e-mail to xyz-request@w3.org with subject "subscribe".

@@ share with us your experiences in using materials @@

Announcement

The following announcement encourages instructors to include accessibility in their Web courses. You may use it as is, or edit it to include in newsletter articles and such, provided that you include a link to this page and send an e-mail to w3t-pr@w3.org informing us of where you sent the material.

E-mail subject or newsletter blurb headline:
W3C WAI materials to help you update your web course for accessibility

[brainstorms in changelog]

@@ students get current info, zingy @@ An important aspect of high quality Web courses is making the Web accessible to people with disabilities. [or: An important aspect of high quality Web courses is including instruction on developing Web sites that are accessible to people with disabilities.] To help you integrate accessibility in your Web courses, W3C WAI provides materials that you can use for lecture, activities, and student study.

See "Integrating Web Accessibility in Courses" at:
      http://www.w3.org/WAI/intro/courses

@@ It's like open source courseware @@

* Web accessibility is an important social, technical, and business issue.

Web accessibility means that people with disabilities can perceive, understand, navigate, and interact with the Web, and that they can contribute to the Web. Currently most Web sites and Web software have accessibility barriers that make it difficult or impossible for many people with disabilities to use the Web. Teaching Web designers, developers, and authors accessibility is a key factor in making Web sites and software accessible, so that people with disabilities can use and contribute to the Web more effectively.

@@ sonsider integrating shorter in first bit @@ Web courses that are up-to-date with the latest trends in the industry include accessibility. Accessibility is being requested more and more in Web site development, as people realize the many benefits of making the Web accessible—for people with and without disabilities, and for Web site owners—and as legal requirements increase. Social, technical, financial, and legal factors of Web accessibility are described at:
     http://www.w3.org/WAI/bcase/Overview.html

* W3C WAI provides material to support Web accessibility.

@@ change pointer to section of the page, leave sentences here @@ The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) is the international consortium that creates Web standards and guidelines such as HTML, CSS, and WCAG.[1] "About the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C)" is at:
      http://www.w3.org/Consortium/
W3C's Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI) works with organizations around the world to develop strategies, guidelines, and resources to help make the Web accessible to people with disabilities. "WAI Mission and Organization" is at:
      http://www.w3.org/WAI/about.html
An "Overview of the Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI)" is at:
      http://www.w3.org/WAI/intro/wai-overview-slides.php

* You can use WAI material for your Web accessibility instruction.

To help you incorporate accessibility in your upcoming Web design and development courses, we put together a resource page, "Integrating Web Accessibility in Courses", at:
      http://www.w3.org/WAI/intro/courses

"Integrating Web Accessibility in Courses" lists:

• Slides and graphics that you can use in your lectures
• Documents for you and your students
• Materials organized by key Web accessibility concepts

For example, one key concept is understanding that the essential components of Web accessibility include web content, authoring tools, evaluation tools, browsers and other user agents, and assistive technologies used by people with disabilities. This concept is explained in a document at http://www.w3.org/WAI/intro/components.php and
"Integrating Web Accessibility in Courses" links to slides with graphics that you can use when teaching this concept in your courses. @@ confirm editing of previous sentence @@

* @@use it - make your students happy

We hope that you will @@bookmark "Integrating Web Accessibility in Courses" and come back to it as you prepare Web course syllabus and materials.

Thank you for your attention to Web accessibility.

Sincerely,

~ Shawn Henry
W3C Web Accessibility Initiative (WAI)
e-mail: shawn@w3.org
phone: +1.617.395.7664
about: http://www.w3.org/People/Shawn/

[1] Acronyms and references:
HTML - HyperText Markup Language, http://www.w3.org/MarkUp/
CSS - Cascading Style Sheets, http://www.w3.org/Style/
WCAG - Web Content Accessibility Guidelines, http://www.w3.org/WAI/intro/wcag.php

Document Information

Version: DRAFT
Editor: Shawn Lawton Henry. Developed with|by participants of the Education and Outreach Working Group (EOWG).

[Contacting WAI] Feedback welcome to wai-eo-editors@w3.org (a publicly archived list).

File (not content) last updated on $Date: 2007/01/17 16:59:34 $ by $Author: shawn $