Creating Accessible Training Materials for Everyone

𝗕𝘂𝗶𝗹𝗱𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗮𝗻 𝗜𝗻𝗰𝗹𝘂𝘀𝗶𝘃𝗲 𝗟𝗲𝗮𝗿𝗻𝗶𝗻𝗴 𝗘𝗻𝘃𝗶𝗿𝗼𝗻𝗺𝗲𝗻𝘁 💡 Are your learning programs inadvertently excluding certain groups of employees? Let's face it: a one-size-fits-all approach in Learning and Development (L&D) can leave many behind, perpetuating inequity and stalling both individual and organizational growth. When learning opportunities aren't equitable, disparities in performance and career advancement become inevitable, weakening your workforce's overall potential. Here’s how to design inclusive L&D initiatives that cater to diverse learning needs and backgrounds: 📌 Conduct a Needs Assessment: Start by identifying the various demographics within your organization. Understand the unique challenges and barriers faced by different groups. This foundational step ensures your L&D programs are tailored to meet diverse needs. 📌 Develop Accessible Content: Design training materials that are accessible to all employees, including those with disabilities. Use subtitles, closed captions, and audio descriptions, and ensure compatibility with screen readers. This ensures everyone can engage fully with the content. 📌 Multimodal Learning Materials: People learn in different ways. Incorporate various formats such as videos, interactive modules, written guides, and live sessions to cater to visual, auditory, and kinesthetic learners. This diversity in material format can enhance comprehension and retention. 📌 Cultural Competency: Make sure your content respects and reflects the cultural diversity of your workforce. Incorporate examples and case studies from various cultural backgrounds to make the material relatable and inclusive. 📌 Flexible Learning Pathways: Offer flexible learning options that can be accessed at different times and paces. This flexibility supports employees who may have varying schedules or commitments outside of work. 📌 Inclusive Feedback Mechanisms: Create channels for feedback that are accessible to all employees. Ensure that feedback is actively sought and acted upon to continuously improve the inclusivity of your L&D programs. 📌 Train Trainers on Inclusive Practices: Equip your trainers with the skills and knowledge to deliver content inclusively. This involves understanding unconscious bias, cultural competency, and techniques to engage a diverse audience. Creating an inclusive learning environment isn’t just about compliance—it’s about unlocking the full potential of every employee. By prioritizing inclusivity, you promote equality, enhance performance, and support a more dynamic and innovative workforce. How are you making your L&D programs inclusive? Share your strategies below! ⬇️ #LearningAndDevelopment #Inclusion #Diversity #WorkplaceLearning #EmployeeEngagement #CorporateTraining

Your course is more than content. It’s a gateway to inclusion. But too often, that gateway is unintentionally locked. Let’s unlock the full potential of your learning design by making accessibility your greatest asset. 1️⃣ Physical Barriers Kill Engagement • Screen readers hit dead ends • Missing captions exclude learners • Navigation feels like a maze ↳ Solution: Build inclusive experiences 2️⃣ Cognitive Overload Destroys Learning • Complex layouts confuse • Information dumps overwhelm • No clear learning path ↳ Solution: Create micro-moments 3️⃣ Tech Friction Blocks Access • Slow loading kills momentum • Large files timeout • Bandwidth battles ↳ Solution: Optimize everything 4️⃣ Design Gaps Create Barriers • Poor contrast ratios • Missing alt text • Keyboard traps ↳ Solution: Follow WCAG 2.1 5️⃣ Support Systems Fall Short • No help channels • Missing feedback loops • Limited options ↳ Solution: Build multiple paths Implementation That Works: Instead of: One-size-fits-all Do this: Multiple format options Instead of: Heavy media files Do this: Compressed alternatives Instead of: Complex navigation Do this: Clear, consistent paths The science is crystal clear: ↳ Higher completion rates ↳ Better engagement scores ↳ Real accessibility wins Your learners deserve equal access. Smart design makes it possible. Inclusive learning changes lives. What small change could you implement today?

👩🦰 Designing Accessibility Personas (https://lnkd.in/evVnB4hd). How to embed accessibility and test for it early in the design process ↓ We often assume that digital products are merely that — products. They either work or don’t work. That they help people meet their needs or fail on their path to get there. But every product has its own embedded personality. It can be helpful or dull, fragile or reliable, supportive or misleading. When we design it, willingly or unwillingly, we embed our values, views and perspectives into it. Sometimes it’s meticulously shaped and refined. And sometimes it’s simply random. And when that happens, users assign their perception of the product’s personality to the product instead. Products are rarely accessible by accident. There must be an intent that captures and drives accessibility efforts in a product. And the best way to do that is by involving people with temporary, situational and permanent disabilities into the design process. One simple way of achieving that is by inviting people with disabilities in the design process. For that, we could recruit people via tools like Access Works or UserTesting, ask admins of groups and channels on accessibility to help, or drop an email to non-profits that work in accessibility space. Another way is establishing accessibility personas for user journeys. Consider them as user profiles that highlight common barriers faced by people with particular conditions and provide guidelines for designers and engineers on how to design and build for them. E.g. Simone, a dyslexic user, or Chris, a user with rheumatoid arthritis. For each, we document known challenges and notable considerations, designing training tasks for designers and developers and instructions to simulate experience through the lens of these personas. By no means does it replace proper accessibility testing, but it creates a shared understanding about what the experiences are like. You can build on top of Gov.uk’s profound research project (https://lnkd.in/evVnB4hd) — it also explains how to set up devices and browsers, so that each persona has their own browser profile. Once you do, you can always switch between them and simulate an experience, without changing settings every single time. All Accessibility Personas (+ Tasks, Research, Setup) https://lnkd.in/evVnB4hd Accessibility doesn’t have to be challenging if it’s considered early. No digital product is neutral. Accessibility is a deliberate decision, and a commitment. Not only does it help everyone; it also shows what a company believes in and values. And once you do have a commitment, and it will be much easier to retain accessibility, rather than adding it last minute as a crutch — because that’s where it’s way too late to do it right, and way too expensive to make it well. [Useful pointers in the comments ↓] #ux #accessibility

Ever asked your GenAI to make a worksheet and thought, “This looks fine”? Now ask yourself: 🤔 Can a student with dyslexia access it? 🤔 Can a learner using a screen reader make sense of it? 🤔 What about a child who reads slowly or needs visual scaffolds? Most AI-generated content isn’t designed for everyone because it is a product of its training data. Statistically it has a likely 'default' or 'norm'. This means that 'standard' prompts often lead to outputs that: ➡️ Use dense, unchunked text ➡️ Have no alt-text, headings or visual cues ➡️ Assume fluent reading, writing, and motor skills ➡️ Lack any option for audio, simplified text, or multiple formats And that’s accessibility bias. It closes doors for learners. It gatekeeps learning. This is Post 1 in my new series: “10 Types of Bias in AI-Generated Content: A Practical Guide for Teachers and Educators.” Attached you can see my guide to accessible prompting. In the downloadable guide, you’ll get: ✔️ Real examples of biased prompts and revised, inclusive alternatives ✔️ Statutory links (SEND Code, Equality Act, WCAG 2.1) ✔️ A bias-mitigating “super prompt” ✔️ A customisable template prompt for use in any subject or age group Have a read through, check out my shared chats, or skip straight to the 'super-prompts' at the end and try it yourself. Let's fight that bias any way we can and let me know any aspects that work well for your learners. What do you think? Al Kingsley MBE Prof Miles Berry Tina Austin Darren Coxon Chris Goodall Arafeh Karimi Tim Dasey Matthew Wemyss Maria Rossini Dan Fitzpatrick Sam Canning-Kaplan Mark Anderson FCCT Tom Moseley James Bedford SFHEA Rachel Kent ChatGPT for Education

Most inaccessible documents aren’t created out of bad intent. No-one does it on purpose. They’re created out of habit. The good news is you don’t need to be an accessibility expert to help build a culture where accessible documents become the norm. Small behaviours, repeated often, shape organisational culture far more than policies do. Here are five simple things anyone can do, right now. (You can also find some further resources in the comments.) 1 - Build accessibility into your workflow Treat accessibility checks the same way you treat spellcheck. Before sending a document, take a minute to run an accessibility check and scan for obvious issues. When accessibility becomes a normal step in the workflow, it stops being an afterthought and starts becoming routine. 2 - Be an ally. You don’t have to personally need accessibility to advocate for it. Ask whether documents have been checked. Encourage colleagues to think about accessibility. If something isn’t accessible, raise it constructively, push back gently if someone sends you something that isn’t accessible. Cultural change often begins with someone asking the question. 3 - Learn the tools you already have Most people already have everything they need. Simple features such as document headings (heading 1, 2 etc), meaningful link titles, and built in accessibility checkers make a huge difference. Learning how to use these properly can transform the usability of a document in minutes. 4 - Think beyond screen readers. Whilst a crucial part of it, accessibility isn’t just about screen reader compatibility. Clear structure, readable layouts, logical headings, and descriptive links make documents easier for everyone to navigate and understand. Accessibility improves usability for the entire organisation. 5 - Automate your mailbox One simple trick is creating an Outlook rule that replies to anyone who sends you an attachment asking whether the document has been checked for accessibility. It’s a gentle prompt that helps build awareness and encourages better habits over time. Bonus tip - set the standard. If you want others to care about accessible documents, your own documents need to set the standard. When people consistently receive accessible content from you, it reinforces that accessibility is not an optional extra. It is simply how good work gets done. Accessibility culture doesn’t start with experts. It starts with everyday habits. ID: a Robbie Crow Purple infographic titled “Five top tips to build a culture of document accessibility”. It summarises the points in this post and full alt text can be found in the image. The graphic uses purple, pale yellow and gold branding with a “Progress Over Perfection” badge at the bottom.

Why the blueberry muffin accessibility analogy works so well for learning content. I still find the blueberry muffin analogy one of the best ways of explaining why it's so important to consider accessibility from the start of a learning project. Of course, you can add in accessibility afterwards, but imagine pushing those blueberries in by hand after the muffin is cooked. Not only does it feel like an afterthought for the learner, but it's also frustrating and time-consuming for the practitioner! In my recent conversation with Bill Banham on the Voices of the Learning Network Podcast, we explored what baking accessibility in from the start looks like - and how accessible design leads to better outcomes for all learners. We discussed simple ways to include accessibility in your everyday practice: - Writing clear, descriptive alt text that adds context. - Providing accurate captions and transcripts that benefit everyone. - Using consistent heading levels so learners and assistive technologies can navigate easily. - Applying good colour contrast. - Using plain language to reduce cognitive load. We also explored practical ways AI can help practitioners apply accessibility and why leadership matters for modelling inclusion, celebrating progress, and embedding accessibility into standards and strategy. When research shows that up to a quarter of your learners may have a disability or experience a temporary or situational access need, accessibility becomes more than a nice-to-have - it's a fundamental part of excellent learning design. So the next time you design a course, remember the blueberry muffin. Accessibility isn't an ingredient to add in at the end - it needs to be baked in from the start. You can listen to my full conversation with Bill at the link below: https://lnkd.in/eiBeiTEr #eLearning #Accessibility #AccessibleLearning #eln (Blueberry muffins on a wooden surface, with fresh blueberries scattered nearby. Baked blueberries are generously distributed through the batter of the muffins, creating deep purple pockets.)

Monday Accessibility Tip for e-Learning and online course design. 💡 Make sure learners can move through content in a logical, consistent order using just the keyboard. This includes modules, lessons, videos, and quizzes. Why It Matters: Keyboard users, including those using screen readers, depend on a predictable flow of information. Disorganized tabbing or unexpected jumps can make learning frustrating or even impossible. What You Can Do: 🔍 Use proper heading levels (H1 for titles, H2 for section headers, etc.) Ensure the tab order follows the visual reading order. Test embedded tools for consistent keyboard navigation. Bonus: ⭐ Include learners with disabilities in your testing phase. Before launching a new course, invite a screen reader or keyboard-only user to test the experience. Their feedback can highlight real-world barriers you might have missed, and improve usability for everyone!

What would you do if your audience couldn't see you or your slides? This past weekend, I had the honor to work with the Florida Business Enterprise Program (BEP), The mission of the BEP is to provide people who are legally blind with rewarding and profitable entrepreneurial ventures, broaden their economic opportunities, and invigorate all blind people to be self-supporting, while dispelling misconceptions about blind people by showcasing their abilities. The BEP administers one of the largest vending and food service programs operated by people who are legally blind in the United States. The BEP prides itself in allowing visually impaired entrepreneurs independence in their day-to-day operations, while at the same time providing continual support through professional business consultants and educational workshops. I was invited to speak because one of their members heard me speak at their National Conference. As a professional speaker I pride myself in making all of my programs an engaging interactive learning experience. Here are few ways I work to make my programs impactful for people with a visual impairment: 1. Paint pictures with your words. Slow down and be very descriptive during your presentation. Let people hear the images you want them to "see." Let people know where you are in the room or where people are who ask questions. Describe in detail what you look like or how you are moving. The people you work with appreciate when you make time to "set the table" before you "serve the meal." 2. Make content accessible before you step on stage. Provide notes or slides in screen-reader friendly formats so everyone can fully participate. 3. Prioritize clarity over flash. Meet with the organization ahead of time to understand participants wants and needs. This will help you establish clear structure, strong pacing, and intentional pauses. 4. Connect through voice and presence. Your tone, energy, and authenticity become your “visuals.” People feel your passion before they see your slides. This experience reminded me: when you strip away distractions, the heart of speaking is human connection. And that’s something everyone can see. 5. Let them participate. Your program can't be engaging if you don't allow the audience to engage. I made time for attendees to share their experiences with me, so I could understand what it was like to be a visually impaired or blind business owner. Participation leads to understanding and as attendees shared with me...a program that isn't boring. Bonus - Be sure to add alt text to all images you post on social media and your website. This allows for people who lack vision to "see" your photograph or image because you can describe the image to them. Thank you Deia Starr Rank and Speaker Exchange for making my experience possible. #keynotespeaker #speakingtips #publicspeakingadvice #workingwiththeblind #mindset

You don’t need an overhaul. You don’t need a task force. Just start. Here’s how to get started today… 1. Fix Your Deck Take 15 seconds and add alt text to each image. Describe what’s important, that’s it. “Person smiling.” that’s weird. And not that helpful or contextual. Colleague laughing during a team meeting with a coffee mug in hand.” That’s way, way better. Alt text not your thing? Build your deck to make sense without images. AccessAbility Pro Tip. Check your contrast. Black text on a grayish background is less edgy and more exclusionary. 2. Stop Breaking PDFs Before sending PDFs you drafted into the wild… Make sure they’re accessible. Can you highlight the text? Can a screen reader navigate it without crying? Go ahead. I dare you. I double dog dare you! Control + Alt + Enter key turns on Narrator for Windows machines. See how long it takes you to read that pdf… Before you start crying… BTW… Accessibility checkers in Adobe Pro don’t catch all violations. Not even close. Digital equity is about meeting people where they are, online! Ask yourself. Is this content better on the world wide web or within the enterprise grip of Adobe? 3. Create Links That Don’t Suck You know what’s cool? A website with a bunch of repeated links… Click here, Click here, Click here, and  Read more, Read more, Read more… #Riveting Why not… Just tell people where the link is taking them? Download our accessibility checklist Register for the webinar Watch Tanner spill coffee during a live presentation 4. Lose Your Mouse Ever lost your mouse? Let’s pretend. Try navigating your website or app only using your keyboard. Keep tabbing like your life depends on it. If you can’t get to the end without rage-quitting, guess what? Neither can someone using a screen reader. 5. Caption Everything Videos… Zoom meetings… Instagram Reels… Everything. Auto-captions are okay, but don’t trust them. What’s the point of putting them there if your beautiful voice can’t clearly be read? You don’t want your big point to get missed in the dust cloud of automation… That’s the point of accurate captions. You don’t need to be perfect… You just need to start. So start. People you include will notice… And so will everyone else. #ThingsTannerSays #Daily #Journaling #Accessibility #A11yTips #Inclusion #JustDoIt