Our latest thoughts from the world of technology in education & the workplace

Texthelp Blog - Our latest thoughts from the world of technology in education & the workplace

Blog

It was at this point my son was assigned a Chromebook as part of my province’s Assistive Technology program. He uses it to help alleviate the exhaustion that comes with writing. A side effect is that there are no more assignments on paper; everything is managed through Google Drive.

At this point, I need to point out that technology is not a panacea. My son experienced some growing pains as he and his teachers adapted to the new realities of what assistive technology could do. My son would use tools like Read&Write to read the French news stories that were his homework to him when he was tired. He would use the Talk&Type feature in Read&Write to dictate when his hands were tired.  I even saw him using my personal favourite, EquatIO, to do some multiplication work for math without me suggesting it!

Slowly, but surely, there were improvements.  By the middle of this school year, I was stopped by his Math and English teacher who told me that while she knew I was concerned about my son’s organizational skills, he was one of the best in the class about handing in his work. She commented that he always got his Chromebook out without prompting and got to work. There were minimal problems with inappropriate use.  A few weeks later, the school’s special education specialist mentioned how amazing my son was with his assistive technology. She suggested we make a video starring my son as he was a textbook example of why this program is important.

It hasn’t been all sunshine and rainbows. My son fell into the trap at one point of trying to game the system with “find” and then “copy and paste” to answer comprehension questions. There have been a couple of supply and student teachers who have refused him the use of the Chromebook because they lack the understanding that it is an accommodation on his IEP and, therefore, a legal requirement. And there are still nights when my son is mentally exhausted from coping with his LD all day and homework time ends early with tears.

But there has been an improvement – My son even sees it. We discussed how he was doing as part of the preparation for this post.  He acknowledges that Assistive Technology has helped him improve academically. He also finds school easier than he did in the past. Like most students who use Assistive Technology, he rarely uses all of the features of the program he is using. Instead, he picks and chooses the tools that are appropriate for the task. And for how he is coping with the LD at that time.

As a parent, I see my son’s self-advocacy improving. He will speak up more often when he is struggling or when he meets the new adult in the classroom who doesn’t understand Assistive Technology. My son will also, matter of factly, tell his peers that he has a Learning Disability, something that all of us with LD need to start doing to begin removing the stigma and ignorance that surrounds that diagnosis.

As a teacher, I also see the unintended benefits of my son’s teachers adapting and accommodating for my son’s use of Assistive Technology.  I have anecdotally heard from other parents in the class that their children also used things like Read&Write at home to listen to their French homework. They appreciate the use of Google Classroom for their children to access the work.

Overall, our family’s journey on this AT/LD road has been a positive one. There is still further to go, as technology and software are always improving and my son’s skills are always growing. But I would encourage any teacher thinking about starting to use Assistive Technology in their classroom to do so. The same for any parent hesitating to sign the form – My son concurs. When I asked what he would say to parents, students or teachers who were considering using Assistive Technology, his answer was “Do it! No, seriously, do it.”

This is a guest blog post from Deanna Toxopeus, an Itinerant Teacher of Assistive Technology at Ottawa Carleton District School Board.

A Year (and a bit) with Assistive Technology

This is a guest blog post from Deanna Toxopeus, an Itinerant Teacher of Assistive Technology at Ottawa Carleton District School Board. The original can be found on Deanna's personal blog: Muffins and Shenanigans.

A little over a year ago my son was diagnosed with as being gifted, with a learning disability. Specifically, he struggled with short term memory.  And, like many people with LD, organization is a challenge. I joke that God doesn’t even know where the papers my son is supposed to bring home from school have gone.  I then comment that apples don’t fall far from trees, as I am also gifted LD, although my LD is in spelling.

First impressions count, and your website gives prospective clients all the information they need to know before deciding if they would like to work with you. It’s important that your content is accessible, so that your welcoming messages are delivered to every single one of your online visitors. Just as you would make adjustments to physical accessibility, the same should be done within your digital presence, to ensure that your content is equally accessible to everyone.

Removing barriers and creating inclusive experiences 

1 in 7 people are disabled and this number is expected to double by 2050. With a growing population of individuals with physical, learning, and cognitive difficulties, it's never been more important to adopt an inclusive mindset. That means making sure your digital content can be accessed and understood by all.

As you map out your online customer journeys, create your content, and design your digital assets, it's important to think about the diverse visitors engaging with your website. Some people may use assistive technologies, such as computer readers and screen magnifiers, and they should be able to freely navigate your digital content, without barriers. Similarly those with color sensitivities, low vision, and reading or processing difficulties should be able to access and understand your online messages.

Complying to legislation and international standards

As governments worldwide strive towards a more inclusive world, more and more countries are putting web accessibility into legislation.

Equality initiative's protect individuals from barriers they would otherwise face in everyday life, whilst legal regulations for web content accessibility ensures that inclusion within the digital world is not forgotten. It's something that should be on everybody's mind.

So what can you do to become more accessible?

Web accessibility standards exist to help organizations become more inclusive. Existing guidelines such as the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) set the international standard for web accessibility. They use the POUR principles, which outline what it means for a website to be perceivable, operable, understandable and robust. For a website to be truly accessible it must follow these four principles. 

Every part of a website should be able to be perceived by every visitor. This means that content should be available in multiple formats. It also considers accessible design choices. For example, good color contrast and typography. This makes it easier for users to see and hear content.

Use metadata to provide text alternatives to images

Minimize visual overload with inclusive design

Use good color contrast between text and background elements

Use a font size that’s easy to read (for example a font size of 12pt/16px)

Web content must be able to be accessed by every visitor. This includes people who use adaptive devices, and those who may suffer seizures or physical reactions. It must also be easy to navigate, helping users find content, and decide where they are.

Optimize web code to ensure that all functionality is available from a keyboard

Ensure users can easily navigate and find content, including visitors using screen readers

Do not use content that could cause seizures, for example don't enable moving imagery to automatically play

Content that someone can access is not necessarily accessible. It must be readable and understandable. Factors to consider are the use of language, abbreviations and pronunciations. This principle also considers how intuitive the website is. Meaning whether it acts in a way which users would expect. Additionally, where visitors are asked to input information, support should be in place. So that users can avoid and correct mistakes.

Use language that can be understood by all site visitors

Give users enough time to read and use content. For example, allow uses to stop and start video content

Be transparent, so visitors understand what actions to take on the site. For example, use link text that tells a user where they will end up

Help users to avoid and correct mistakes. For example, include field labels on forms. And highlight errors with a combination of both text and color

Each individual accesses the web using technology which suits their needs and preferences. That means your website should be compatible for use across different devices and browsers, including assistive technologies.

Optimize your website for use with assistive technologies

Maximize compatibility with current and future user tools

To help, we've created a guide which outlines some tools to support you as you take action. Get the guide, it's free.

In this blog, we identify what it means to make sure your website is perceivable, operable, understandable, and robust. In other words, truly accessible.

Have your POURed enough into website compliance?

Have you POURed enough into website compliance?

Every organization strives to provide excellence in customer service and we know that your customers and service users are at the heart of everything you do, but does your website live up to your standards?

In this blog, we identify what it means to make sure your website is perceivable, operable, understandable, and robust. In other words, truly accessible. 

In order to activate change within their community, bold educators first and foremost have to be willing to activate change within themselves. At Tuesday’s keynote, both Alicia Duell (Director of Technology and Information Services at Wheeling CCSD21) and Phil Hansen (Artist, Speaker, Author) spoke about experiences in their professional lives that encouraged them to embrace flexibility and pave new paths to success.

Alicia spoke about failure and the impact it had on her life. As she explained, we are conditioned to think of failure as a weakness. But, failure is part of the shared human experience. And if we talk about it, we can actually turn failure into a positive educational tool. By being flexible, Alicia was able to take a negative situation and turn it into a positive lesson that she has since shared with students, educators, and now ISTE attendees.

Similarly, Phil shared how a tremor in his hand almost stopped him from pursuing his passion as an artist. However, instead of quitting, he “embraced the shake”. By being flexible, he owned his limitations, which ended up driving his creativity.

Bold educators must also embrace flexibility when it comes to the learning environment. In Allison Posey’s session on “Two Design Frameworks to Support Emotions and Learning”, she explained a core concept of Universal Design for Learning (UDL): the burden of change.

Historically, the burden of change has been placed on the student, which means that if they were struggling, they would have to adapt to an inflexible learning environment. However, as UDL teaches, the burden of change should be placed on the design of the learning environment itself. The environment should be designed to be flexible, providing multiple means of representation, expression and engagement in order to remove barriers to learning for all learners.

To go one step further, in her panel discussion on “Design Thinking and UDL: Connecting the Dots”, Mindy Johnson suggested that teachers should include learners in their designs and co-design with them in order to create usable knowledge. To do this successfully, teachers need to be open to a flexible learning environment that can adjust with the recommendations and visions of their students.

Finally, bold educators need to choose education technology that has the flexibility to support all learners. In Mike Marotta’s session, “Promote a UDL Learning Environment with Google Tools”, he explained that “the power of Chrome is that it creates a flexible environment for students to learn.” Thanks to Chrome’s wide variety of built-in supports, as well as extensions like Read&Write and EquatIO, it is flexible enough to support an array of student needs across all areas of learning.

How will you embrace flexibility in order to become a bold educator who activates change? What were some of your other key takeaways from ISTE 2019? Share your thoughts below!

With ISTE 2019 come and gone, it’s now time to reflect on what we learned and what takeaways we want to bring back to our communities.

Speakers Flexed their Flexibility Muscles at ISTE 2019

The theme of this year’s conference was “bold educators activate change”. So in reflecting, I asked myself what I learned about bold educators. What do bold educators look like? What are their attributes? How do they impact their classrooms and students? Based on the sessions I attended, I kept coming back to one answer to all those questions: flexibility.

Best of Show is Tech & Learning’s awards program that honors products being showcased at the annual ISTE conference, the largest EdTech event of the year. An anonymous panel of judges reviews the nominated products, evaluating them on “quality and effectiveness, ease of use, cost, and creative use of technology.”

We are honored to announce that WriQ was named one of the winner’s at this year’s ISTE 2019, which took place in Philadelphia from June 23 - 26.

WriQ is a Chrome extension that helps teachers instantly assess student writing and provide valuable feedback seamlessly in Google Docs. It automatically analyzes the documents for spelling, grammar, and punctuation errors, and provides helpful metrics like time on task, vocabulary maturity and more. In doing this, WriQ standardizes the scoring of student writing, helping teachers consistently track progress over time and improve student achievement.

Introduction to WriQ

Thank you to Tech & Learning and the judges for recognizing WriQ as one of this year’s ISTE Best of Show winners. To explore the tool for yourself, add it to Chrome from the Chrome Web Store today!

We are pleased to announce that WriQ was named one of the winners of Tech & Learning’s ISTE Best of Show 2019 award.

WriQ Wins Tech & Learning’s ISTE Best of Show 2019

WriQⓇ Wins Tech & Learning’s ISTE Best of Show 2019

If you had the privilege to be in Las Vegas for SHRM 2019, I am sure you would agree that the sheer scale of the event, the quality of speakers and fantastic location will make it one that will be hard to forget. 

We were delighted to host a booth in the exhibition area, and we had great conversations with many HR Professionals in various industries, sharing their accessibility/ diversity challenges and requirements.

We also took the opportunity to carry out some research, into priorities within the HR Profession. You may have spotted me walking around the hall sparking up conversations with many delegates. If you were one of the individuals I spoke to, thank you for your time and valuable insights. 

The question I asked during my walkabouts was...if you had to pick one, which would you prioritize - Accessibility Compliance, Diversity and Inclusion or Employee Productivity.

The clear priority for many of your peers with 47.7% is employee productivity. Followed by diversity and inclusion with 34.1% and accessibility compliance with 18.2%. It is important to note that for different industries, there was a pattern in terms of focus. 

Many delegates within the manufacturing industry selected employee productivity due to the business needs and output demands from those companies. Similar with healthcare, it is crucial to have perfect productivity to ensure healthcare is efficient and delivered quickly to those who need it.

For those that selected Diversity and Inclusion, the main reason why they choose this was because they mentioned that it was evident that their own organization lacked diversity and they knew they needed to make improvements. A few individuals made it clear that diversity within CSuite needed to change and most managers at that level, needed to be educated further in order for recruitment practices to be transformed. 

Unsurprisingly, most individuals from government departments choose accessibility compliance.Those that didn’t, knew they already had this area covered and so this wasn’t a concern, or focus. 

I also had the privilege to sit in on the great sessions on offer. And one in particular stood out. With one key question..why do you look forward to going to work each day? 

Rob Namba from ADP wants to elevate the talent experience by identifying employee vulnerabilities and using a certain level of fear and weakness to encourage, support and push that employee to go that bit further. To the benefit of the employee and the business. 

We couldn’t agree more. Who doesn’t want to strive for greatness, to make themselves better. 

And hopefully with the priorities of all HR Professionals attending SHRM this year, they may go back to their organisations to drive change and support existing and new employees. Be it through supports to encourage an individual to become more productive and more proud of their work. Or employing more diverse individuals with a host of new talent and skills, that later appreciates the open mindedness and encouragement from all levels of management. 

So, I will leave you with the opening question of the blog for you to answer. Why do you look forward to work? 

Find out our what Texthelp got up to at the SHRM Annual Conference in Las Vegas

SHRM19: I look forward to work because

SHRM19: I look forward to work because…

Did you attend SHRM this year? Read more about our research and key takeaways in our wrap up blog. 


 
 
 New mobile toolbar, offering easier fingertip navigation

We have updated the Browsealoud mobile toolbar to make it even easier to access and use the reading support across all mobile devices, including small screens.

New placement -  the first thing you will notice is that we have changed where the toolbar is positioned. When launched, the toolbar opens away from the launchpad and sits full width along the bottom of the screen. This snug position means it is less obtrusive to small screens, and on-screen content can be viewed freely. The position is also a common place for mobile toolbars, making the experience familiar to mobile users.

Improved accessibility - we have increased the size of the icons as well as the space between each icon, to make the toolbar more accessible and easier to navigate.

Sharper design - the toolbar has been given a crisper look and pops against the backdrop of common website designs, to ensure it can be easily viewed against surrounding elements.

Choice of color - the default toolbar color is Browsealoud orange, but there are three color schemes to choose from if the orange doesn’t sit well with your brand.  Users also have the ability to choose between the three color schemes during their browsing session.

Intuitive icons - as well as making the icons more prominent in size, we have updated them with more intuitive symbols.  ‘Point to speak’ now includes a ‘play’ symbol to indicate the function of the button, and changes to a ‘stop’ icon once pressed. A new ‘settings’ icon identifies where users can personalize the tool, and the ‘close’ icon is now contained within the toolbar, so that it is more easily identified.

Easier personalisation - the new ‘settings’ icon opens up a settings menu, where the user can select their language, set the voice speed and change color theme, all within one simple menu.


 New launchpad option for mobile and desktop

First impression counts, and we are now offering a new launchpad with a more intuitive design - featuring both pictorial and word descriptives, the launchpad clearly shows that when pressed, a helpful tool will be launched.

Universal design - the use of symbols which are universally recognized help demonstrate the tool’s function to all types of users. Even better, the label is localized dependent on the default language attributed to the page.

Choice of placement - the new launchpad is embedded into a website with code. This means it stays static in one position, so it is friendlier for small mobile screens. It also means it can be placed in a position where it will be easily noticed.

If you would like to know more about how Browsealoud can improve the experience for your online visitors, read more here.

As you’d expect, we’re constantly looking at usage stats to inform the development of our technologies and Browsealoud is no different. Now that almost 70% of our users are accessing Browsealoud from a mobile device we thought it was a good time to take a fresh look at our mobile user experience.

Blog

A Year (and a bit) with Assistive Technology

Have you POURed enough into website compliance?

Speakers Flexed their Flexibility Muscles at ISTE 2019

WriQⓇ Wins Tech & Learning’s ISTE Best of Show 2019

SHRM19: I look forward to work because…

Mobile users greeted with a more intuitive Browsealoud

Categories

Education

Solutions

Products

Workplace

Solutions

Products

Resources

Resource center

Events

Learn & Support

Company