Welcome to the course Web accessibility, the basics.
What is web accessibility? And why should you make your web project accessible?
With web accessibility we mean that a web project is usable by as many people as possible, on as many different devices as possible.
For example:
- A young web developer who uses a laptop with a keyboard and a mouse.
- A blind person who uses a desktop computer, keyboard and a screen reader.
- A blind and deaf user, who uses a desktop computer, keyboard, screen reader and braille display.
- A traveler who uses a smartphone in the train with a slow WiFi connection.
- An elderly person who uses an iPad in bright sunlight.
- A child that broke an arm and uses only the keyboard.
You can come up with a lot of ways to use the internet. Gov.uk published useful research: Using persona profiles to test accessibility
How many people are we talking about?
As for disabilities, the estimate is that approximately 20% of all people have some sort of disability. That’s 20% of your visitors. And as the population grows older, this number will increase.
We are all different and the situations we find ourselves in differ too. It’s not only people with disabilities that use the web differently than you might expect. If you make your work accessible, then all users will benefit.
Let’s get started
To help you make your web project work for as many people as possible, we will provide you with guidelines and best practices.
At the end of each paragraph and chapter, we have put together a few small tests: questions, exercises and assignments.
The exercises and assignments allow you to reflect on your own project. If you work through all the assignments, you will end up with a solid strategy on how to improve your work. They are designed to help you get a real understanding of how accessibility impacts your work and how to improve it.
In the videos, you see and hear Rian Rietveld, specialist in web accessibility at Level Level and trainer at the A11y Collective.
Thank you for following this course. We look forward to building a more accessible web together!
