There are many steps we can take to accommodate the needs of all learners. For those that are English language learners, we can make translations available for all of our content. For those with loss of hearing, we can have captions available on any video or multimedia content. For the single parent who is working full-time with 2 children, all of the content can be made available online in a learning management system so that they can access it asynchronously at their convenience.
For colour-blind learners, there are multiple things we can do. One method of catering to this group of learners is to ensure that all content in the class, which will be available digitally through an online learning management system will be visually adjusted to ensure they appear on screen with the right levels of contrast. But when it comes to working on the interactive learning activities which involve more visual learning and collaboration, this alone may not suffice. As a result, our online learning management system will have an additional feature that allows colour-blind users to simply click on a part of a diagram or image with a colour that seems ambiguous to them, and that colour will be instantly identified by a text-based graphic that pops up. Such measures will hopefully mitigate the challenges faced by colour-blind learners.
For a person that does not have access to a computer at home but has a mobile phone with a data plan. Since learners will be able to work on computers available during the class, this person will likely not be impeded in any way while they are with everyone else in class. However, they would face some challenges when they try to access the class material outside of class hours through the online learning management system. Our approach to mitigating this issue would be to have our online learning management system incorporate responsive design and data minimization. Responsive design is an approach to web design that makes web pages render well on a variety of different devices and window sizes ranging from small to large [2]. In this particular context, it would involve ensuring that the online learning management system follows responsive design principles so that all the class materials can be viewed on the small screen of a smart phone with ease, while still giving the learner full access to all the material. This could involve things such as making sure content appears larger with a menu that is easier to navigate by touch on a small screen. When it comes to data minimization, this is about ensuring that the learner can access the class material online without having to use up too much of the data they get from their data plan. This involves making sure that along with responsive design, the online learning management system has features in place that ensure that the content appears on a smartphone without having to consume too much data. This could involve various strategies such as displaying only the content that is necessary and pertinent to the topic the learner is viewing, and displaying any images, multimedia and graphics at a slightly lower resolution.
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