Canvas Accessibility

Use Styles in Canvas

Make sure to use styles when adding text into Canvas' Rich Content Editor ( =the textbox where you enter your page content). This allows student with vision impairment to use screen-reading software to distinguish between titles and regular text. If you don't use styles, all of your text will run together, and screen reader won't be able to tell the hierarchical structure of your content.

To use styles, simply type your text, highlight it, then select the proper style: Paragraph (regular text), Header 2 (large font), Header 3 (medium text), and Header 4 (smaller font).

Canvas uses Header 1 for its page title, so begin with Header 2, then use Header 3 for subheadings. Do not skip heading styles. The purpose of these is to denote the hierarchy in content organization.

Two other notes about the Rich Content Editor and accessibility:

When using numbers to put text into a list, use the editor's list Numbered list tool as opposed to typing in the numbers. This allows the screen reader to read the content more meaningfully. Using the Bullet list tool is also helpful.
It gets kind of tricky to make accessible tables in Canvas. If you do, use the accessibility checker in Canvas to help with table accessibility.

Adding Alt Text to an Image in Canvas

Images must have text alternatives that describe the image. Providing alternate text ensures that the visually impaired student can hear a description of the image. Screen readers will read aloud the alternate text. Alternate text is usually referred to as alt text.

After you upload an image into Canvas, use the Embed Image icon in the Rich Content Editor to place the image where you desire.

General or Detailed?

How general or detailed the alt text is depends on the purpose of the image. When entering alt text, ask yourself the following questions:

What is the purpose of the image?
If you were to describe the image to someone over the phone, what would you say?
Is the image just there for visual appeal?
Is there text in the image?

Common Mistakes

Here are the two most common mistakes regarding alt text for images:

Not entering alt text. If you don't enter anything for alt text, then the default is the image name. This is not helpful for people using screen readers. How would you like to hear this as an image description: Image ch3fig1 hyphen v2 period jpg?
Alt text should not include "image of," "image," "picture," or "photo." When the screen reader reads aloud the alt text, it first says that it's an image.
Don't use the filename of the image as the alt text, particularly because it includes file extensions (.jpg, .gif, .png).
If your image contains text, make sure to include those same words as alt text.
Check the Decorative Image box if the image has no pedagogical value and is simply for decoration.

Using Explanatory Links

Good link text should not be overly general; don't use "click here" as a link. "Click here" says nothing about what is to be found if the link is followed. Instead of "click here", link text should be explanatory and indicate the nature of the link target.

Linked text should tell the users where the link will go if they choose that link. In the sentence below, users know that if they choose the link, they will go to the Accessibility Community in Canvas.

Learn about Canvas' accessibility efforts in its Accessibility Community.

In poor examples, the linked text does not indicate where the link will go. In the sentence below, it is not clearly understood that the link will go to the Strawberry Nutritional Guide.

Click here to see the Accessibility Community in Canvas.

Finally, do not underline text that is not a link as means of emphasis. If you are typing the name of a book, use italics; when students see a word(s) that is underlined, they will think it's a link.