[gradebook2-dev] Fwd: [WG: Accessibility] Results of accessibility testing at Miami University (RE Accessibility Vol 23, Issue 2)

Tue Apr 19 20:32:34 PDT 2011

forwarding from sakai-dev

gb2 specific comments wrt accessibility testing

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Amy Greenbaum <greenbaum.a at gmail.com>
Date: Thu, Mar 3, 2011 at 1:48 PM
Subject: [WG: Accessibility] Results of accessibility testing at Miami
University (RE Accessibility Vol 23, Issue 2)
To: accessibility at collab.sakaiproject.org

Hi everyone.  I am writing regarding to the emails from Clay and Brian
in Vol 23, Issue 2
Here at  Miami University (in beautiful Oxford, Ohio) we recently
tested our pilot Sakai 2.7.X instance with JAWS and Kurzweil Reader.
The JAWS testing was performed by a faculty member who uses JAWS on a
daily basis and relies on it for computer access and done with members
of the IT team and a representative from Longsight.  Here are some
specific notes from our testing.

During JAWS testing, we noted the following:

●     General Experience

○     Overall, navigation through Niihka was good, and JAWS and
Kurzweil were able to read/page through the Niihka screens in the
right order, starting with site tabs, then progressing to tool links,
and finally main page content.

○     Both JAWS and Kurzweil were able to handle the Niihka skin
developed by Longsight from the design provided by University
Communications. Although it should be tested with colorblind
simulation software, on the whole the team felt the design should not
present any problems for colorblnd users, with one minor recommended
change below.

○     In course sites with many tools added, proceeding through the
left menu could be a lengthy process. We suspect there might be a JAWS
command that will skip the menu, but that may need to be researched.

○     We found that the JAWS command ‘Alt+Shift+S’ would save or
submit a form. This can be a helpful tip for JAWS users because it can
allow them to proceed to the next page in Niihka without having to
iterate over every piece of text or link.

○     The left-hand tool menu has tool tips that describe the linked
tools, which is useful for a variety of disabled users.

●     Site Info tool (Control Panel)

○     A JAWS user could successfully navigate to the Site Info tool
and add and remove site tools.

●     The Forums tool

○     JAWS was able to read the student’s post and did allow the
instructor to reply, but the threaded, hierarchical nature of the
thread was not effectively communicated.

○     JAWS did not read how many messages were unread, which may be
helpful information for Instructors.

●     Assignments2

○     Overall the experience here was good, links were easy to
understand, but JAWS users may need some guidance as to the general
layout.

●     Gradebook2

○     Due to Gradebook2’s advanced layout, navigating through the
fields was especially challenging, and JAWS users could not
consistently move from one side of the Gradebook to the other.

○     Many of the links which are selectable for mouse users could not
be selected when using JAWS.

○     Although we could navigate to the student fields in the
Gradebook, JAWS did not read the student names (instead it called them
all 'unlabeled zero button') and we were not able to read or enter
grades for individual students.

●     Rich text editor

○     Although we were able to get in and out of the rich-text editor
box and JAWS was able to read student responses in the rich-text
editor box, doing so was slightly challenging and unintuitive.

○     Cntrl+Down arrow gets out of the box, then the user can tab into next box.

Recommendations

Overall, we advise a combination of styling tweaks, end-user help
documents, community recommendations and continued testing.

We found unstyled blue text on grey buttons (example: 'Begin
Assessment' button) hard to read on the Kurzweil test machine. A more
high-contrast button would be easier to read. (We will be changing
this to black text on beige.)

Kurzweil 1000 and 3000 have different user experiences, both should be tested.

Overall Niihka layout description was helpful for our JAWS user and
helped orient her to the actions expected by the system. Online
webcasts (with focus on audio descriptions) could provide this
orientation in a just-in-time, on-demand way.

Testing should determine if additional styling on multiple choice
radio buttons is needed for easier readability.

JAWS doesn't read the tool menu tool tips. Research is needed to see
if any of the screen readers could be configured to do this on an
optional basis.

Research is needed to see if the rich-text editor box could be
disabled for those using screen-readers. Alternatively, a preference
setting could be created where a user could indicate that they always
wanted the rich-text editor disabled.

Another avenue of investigation is editor alternatives, Niihka uses
the default Sakai rich-text editor, FCKEditor. This could be swapped
out for the TinyMCE editor, which is reputed to have better
accessibility support. In the next version of Sakai, the updated
CKEditor is also an option. TinyMCE and CKEditor should be evaluated
to see if they are preferred to the default (FCKEditor).

Miami University has already engaged the Sakai Community Accessibility
list, a valuable resource for current accessibility solutions and
future plans for accessibility support in Sakai.

Due to the difficultly of using Gradebook2, we recommend that the
original Gradebook tool be investigated as a case-by-case solution for
those instructors using JAWS or other screen readers. Although
Gradebook does not have all the features of Gradeboook2, it’s simpler
layout will be much more navigable.

Please let me know if you have any questions,

Thank you,

Amy

______________________________

Amy Greenbaum
HR Technology & Communication Analyst
Department of Human Resources
Miami University
Roudebush Hall, 15
Oxford, OH 45056
greenbal at muohio.edu or greenbaum.a at gmail.com
o: (513) 529-4925
f: (513) 529-4223

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