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Re: text in addition to arrows for flashcard navigation?

for

From: Murray Inman
Date: Sep 1, 2022 10:04AM

Very excellent point Steve! Thank you for the reminder.

One thing that I have learned is that when it comes to accessibility, and
something that I try to help people understand, is that accessibility is a
very personal experience for every user. The best way to improve overall
accessibility is to talk to more people (especially those less-similar to
ourselves) and provide options where possible.

I hereby revise my recommendation to keep both text and icon, but to be
sure that the icon doesn't repeat the same thing as the text. I find that
in most situations like this, hiding the icon from screen readers
with aria-hidden="true" attribute works well. A good resource to check is
the accessibility section of Font Awesome
<https://fontawesome.com/docs/web/dig-deeper/accessibility> that breaks
down different common use cases for icon use.

Murray Inman
Manager, Instructional Media and Accessibility
VP, Ability Maricopa Employees with Disability Advocacy Group
Rio Salado College | https://riosalado.edu



On Thu, Sep 1, 2022 at 8:43 AM Steve Green < <EMAIL REMOVED> >
wrote:

> You cannot assume that text gives all users a similar experience. Some
> people, especially those with cognitive impairments, benefit greatly from
> the provision of supporting images.
>
> In user testing sessions I have seen people with dyslexia completely fail
> tasks even though they text they needed to complete the task was right in
> front of them. In one case it was a 24pt bold red error message, but
> although they saw it, it just didn't register. In that case the participant
> reckoned that it would have registered if the text was supported by an icon
> or had a thick border.
>
> The lesson for me was that it's really difficult to understand what some
> people perceive when presented with text. It's not just about the words -
> it's about the position, spacing, background colour, supporting imagery and
> other factors. There is no such thing as "universal design"!
>
> Steve Green
> Managing Director
> Test Partners Ltd
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: WebAIM-Forum < <EMAIL REMOVED> > On Behalf Of
> Murray Inman
> Sent: 01 September 2022 16:29
> To: WebAIM Discussion List < <EMAIL REMOVED> >
> Subject: Re: [WebAIM] text in addition to arrows for flashcard navigation?
>
> I would suggest considering the removal of the icon and keeping the text.
> Generally, only screen readers benefit from alt text images and using an
> icon assumes the user has similar cultural iconography experience or has
> the cognitive ability to understand the implied meaning. Whereas, keeping
> the text will give all users, sighted or unsighted, a similar experience.
> It also has the benefit of being available to other technologies like page
> translators and browser extensions that can define words that the user
> doesn't understand.
>
>
> Murray Inman
>
> Manager, Instructional Media and Accessibility
>
> VP, Ability Maricopa Employees with Disability Advocacy Group
>
> 480-517-8561 | <EMAIL REMOVED>
>
> RIO SALADO COLLEGE | https://riosalado.edu
>
> 2323 West 14th Street, Tempe, AZ 85281
>
> Definition of "Accessible" <http://learnatrio.com/accessibilityDefined>;
> by the Office for Civil Rights
>
>
> On Tue, Aug 30, 2022 at 1:00 PM Mike Warner < <EMAIL REMOVED> > wrote:
>
> > Hi all,
> >
> > we have a flashcard feature that works great and passed the
> > accessibility audit from a very well-known organization. As it
> > currently is, there are three columns of divs. The first column is
> > the navigation for the previous card and contains an arrow icon link
> > (with appropriate alt
> > text) and a corresponding text link that says "Previous Card." The
> > middle column is the card, and the right column is the navigation for
> > the next slide, with the icon and text as previously described. Since
> > the arrow icons have alt text, do we need the text in addition to the
> > icons? It seems like the text is not needed, but I wanted to run it
> > by this list before making a change to accommodate a learner.
> >
> > Thanks,
> > Mike
> >
> > Mike Warner
> > Director of IT Services
> > MindEdge Learning
> > > > > > archives at http://webaim.org/discussion/archives
> > > >
> > > at http://webaim.org/discussion/archives
> >