The current state of accessibility of MOOCs: What are the next steps?

Francisco IniestoSupervisors : Patrick McAndrew, Shailey Minocha and Tim Coughlan

The Open University

GO-GN Seminar10-11 April 2016, Krakow, Poland

1. Who am I? 2. Rationale. Study context

3. Methodology and Hypotheses

4. Studies

5. Conclusions

WHO AM I?• Computer Engineer at UAM. Extensive experience in IT consulting and software

development using Agile techniques• Mst. in Languages and Computer Systems. Specialized in teaching, learning, collaboration

and adaptation at UNED. Master's thesis: Accessibility and standardization in the cycle of creation educational materials.

• Part time PhD research student at UNED : Accessibility issues in MOOCs: potential services for people with special needs. (Covadonga Rodrigo & Timothy Read)

• Full time PhD research student at the Open University and in the Institute of Educational Technology (IET), under the program Leverhulme Open World Learning (OWL): researching accessibility and Massive Online Open Courses (MOOCs). (Patrick McAndrew, Shailey Minocha & Tim Coughlan)

• Member of the Global OER Graduate Network, a worldwide network of PhD researchers and their supervisors in the field of Open Educational Resources (OERs), MOOCs and open learning.

• Collaborator on research projects: OpenScout, research chair “Technology and Accessibility” UNED – Vodafone Foundation and OLA!.

RATIONALE. STUDY CONTEXT

Indeed, the Porto Declaration on European MOOCs highlights:

“Importantly, we stress that MOOCs must not be seen as the outcome or exemplar of online education. Rather they need to be understood in a wider context as there is a long history of research on open and online education and a variety of approaches and tools to provide quality learning opportunities to all.”

It is this aspect of providing ‘opportunities to all’ that can only be achieved if MOOCs are accessible to all.

RATIONALE. STUDY CONTEXT

2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015 20160

1000

2000

3000

4000

5000

6000

7000

8000

9000

25542966

34623830

4283 42244808

6294 6104

7469 7670 78477469 7397

UNED Disabled Student Registrations

2003 2004 2005 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 20130

100

200

300

400

500

600

700

800

900

34 50

185139

320

405462

647709 728

804

UOC Disabled Student Registrations

2013

UB 682 27,70%UAB 337 13,69%UPC 158 6,42%UPF 120 4,87%UdL 56 2,27%UdG 103 4,18%URV 146 5,93%UOC 804 32,66%URL 39 1,58%UVic-UCC 10 0,41%UIC 5 0,20%UAO 2 0,08%Total 2.462 100%

Students distributed by disability at UNED 2015\2016

Students with disabilities registered in Catalonia, 2013

3874

1380

357

572

27

658

141182

36 38 29 18 526 27

PhysicalMentalHearingVisualPhysical, Visual, hearing, mentalPhysical, MentalPhysical, HearingPhysical, VisualPhysical, Hearing, MentalPhysical, Visual, MentalPhysical, Visual, HearingHearing, MentalVisual, MentalVisual, Hearing, MentalVisual, Hearing

RATIONALE. STUDY CONTEXT

Context: lll for people with special needs

OU’s Equality and Diversity Annual Report states: “More than 21,000 disabled students are now registered, representing just over 12% of the OU student body. This is double the proportion of three years ago and far in excess of the performance indicator in the University’s equality objectives”.

Distance education in general attracts more disabled students than traditional education, and this trend is emphasised further in open education:

• 12% of students of the Open University in the UK (OU) are disabled • (8% in the rest of UK universities)

• 16 % of the users of open resources published by the OU (via iTunesU, YouTube and OpenLearn) declared a disability

RATIONALE. STUDY CONTEXT

Context: ICT + Disabilities:

• The possibilities that ICT offer people with disabilities to improve their wellbeing and the possibility of their insertion into the work market.

• The fact to make digital people with special needs increases the work rate in this collective.

• 100% consider that the incorporation of ICT into the workplace has increased their work possibilities.

Context: Accessible MOOC Learning:

Benefits such as:

• Openness • Low cost • Ubiquity (Time, space and

rhythm)• Acquiring knowledge • Social learning: Connectivism • Achieving new competences • Develop professionally

ACCESSIBILITY ISSUES IN MOOCs

MOOC platforms: • Web based eLearning engines • Scheduling academic curriculum • Synchronous and asynchronous

communication Interface elements:

• Logging in, logging out • Navigating in courses and content• Multi layered structures eLearning materials:

• Specific technology.

Barriers :

• The interface elements• The manner in which users interact with

these objects • Components which do not always share

a consistency of interface logic:

• Posting in a forum • Making up elements in tests

or timed quizzes• Embedded videos • Variety of document formats

Effective eLearning environment :

• Learner’s abilities• Learning goals• Where learning takes place • Which specific devices the learner uses

HOW SHOULD THE MODEL FOR AN ACCESSIBLE MOOC PLATFORM BE?

The minimum required level of accessibility :

Guarantee access to the content by means of the platforms.

Produce the content accessible in itself.

Evaluate the access conditions. The technological platform. The content of the MOOC must

be the same for all of the students.

The students must be able to access the content using assistive technologies.

It is necessary to offer alternative textual descriptions for multimedia content.

Assistance must be provided.

RATIONALE. STUDY CONTEXT

Group of papers Reference DescriptionAssessment with users Sanchez-Gordon &

Luján-Mora, 2013Five Coursera courses for evaluating the accessibility of the Coursera platform and the contents of these courses, with a particular focus on learners in their old age

Al-mouh, Al-khalifa & Al-khalifa, 2014

Ten Coursera courses of different disciplines for their suitability for blind or partially sighted learners; none of the courses reached the minimum level of accessibility

Bohnsack & Puh, 2014 Five MOOC platforms for blind users: Udacity, Coursera, edX, OpenCourseWorld, Iversity. Except for edX, all the other platforms had severe accessibility problems.

Student data Rizzardini, Chang,

Gütl & Amado-Salvatierra, 2013

MOOC that incorporated accessibility features to benefit a true open online education for the wider population. The MOOC at Galileo University was designed to provide equity access

Liyanagunawardena & Williams, 2016

Pre-course survey for 10 courses on the FutureLearn platform to show evidence that learners in their old age are already participating in MOOCs

MOOC framework Sanchez-Gordon &

Luján-Mora, 2014Two categories of web accessibility requirements: for personal and for non-personal disabilities. Both MOOC's platforms and contents must meet web accessibility requirements

Sanchez-Gordon & Luján-Mora, 2015

Three-layer architecture to extend the Open edX platform to enhance the accessibility

Rodríguez-Ascaso & Boticario, 2015

MOOC framework consisting of services, standards and quality procedures related to accessibility

RESEARCH QUESTIONS

The educational context. How MOOCs can help people with disabilities to improve their knowledge and

skills?

Accessibility state. How could the accessibility in MOOCs be improved?

Adaptation and delivery. How could MOOCs resources be adapted to meet the accessibility needs of the

end-users?

HYPOTHESES

1. Accessible MOOCs -> to people with disabilities who are those ones that most barriers encounter when accessing educational environments.

2. Tool to assess and know the status of the accessibility of MOOC courses and their platforms can provide indicators of the main problems found in them.

3. These indicators may be useful to adapt the educational content to the end user.

4. To derive recommendations for accessible MOOCs, and develop guidance on how MOOCs can be more accessible

METHODS

•Methodologically -> the study will be mixed-methods.

• Interviews

• Questionnaires

• Usability and accessibility test

• Technical accessibility evaluation-> evaluation instrument

STUDIES

Q1 Study 2(b, c)Study 3 aStudy 4 a

Q2 Study 1Study 2 (a, b)Study 3 (a, b)Study 4 bStudy 5

Q3 Study 2 (a, b, c)Study 3 aStudy 4 bStudy 5

Study 1. Understanding accessibility policies• Accessibility policies in the

major MOOC platforms• Typology of information

quality Accessibility

statementCountry \ Language Type \ For profit

Coursera X USA, English Network \ CommercialedX X USA, English Network \ Non-profitUdacity USA, English Network \ CommercialCanvas X USA, English Network \ CommercialLagunitaStanford Online

USA, English University

Khan Academy USA, English Network \ Non-ProfitNovoEd X USA, English Network \ CommercialPeer to Peer University USA, English Network \

Non-ProfitFutureLearn X UK, English Network \ Non-ProfitThe University of Edimburg X UK, English University

Open2Study X Australia, English Network \Commercial

Iversity Germany, German\English Network \ CommercialOpenCourseWorld Germany, German\English Network Uned Coma Spain, Spanish UniversityMiriadax Spain, Spanish\Portuguese Network \ CommercialUPV [X] Spain, Spanish UniversityTelescopio Guatemala, Spanish Network \ Non-ProfitUab iMOOC Portugal, Portuguese UniversityEco Learning X European project Network \ Non-Profit

Feedback!

STUDIES

Study 2 (a, b, c). The opinion of stakeholders

• Three periods of interviews. Semi-structured interviews, 45 minutes, blocks related to the research questions

• MOOC platform providers, course providers and MOOC experts.• WIP, 3 interviews done at the moment, 5 interviews confirmed, 4

waiting for confirmation

• End-users.

• MOOC platform providers, course providers and MOOC experts.

• Thematic analysis

• Human Research Ethics Committee process Feedback!

STUDIES

Study 3 (a, b). Large-scale data from users

• Data from past courses in FutureLearn

• Questionnaire (survey) in a MOOC course.

• Start of course survey -> educational expectations.

• End of curse survey -> accessibility evaluation.

• Carry out this study within a MOOC -> related to accessibility and usability. 

Feedback!

STUDIES

Study 4 (a, b). The user interaction. Usability and accessibility studies

• Accessibility and usability tests in the laboratories to users with and without disabilities to interact with MOOCs.

• Data from FutureLearn related to user interaction on MOOCs.

• “steps” include all the interactions users perform inside a course such as visualizing a video-lesson

Feedback!

 

STUDIES

Study 5 (a, b, c). Data using the evaluation instrument

• Iterative method of trial and error. The evaluation instrument is developed by iterative steps that will improve the instrument.

• First iteration will be focused primary in the use of automatic tools, tutored by an expert from the IET in order to avoid biases.

• Second iteration of this instrument -> vector of characteristics, it will

be reviewed by several international accessibility experts.

• Third iteration -> the final vector of characteristics.

Feedback!

FEEDBACK BETWEEN STUDIES

Evaluation instrumentData from questionnaires

Providers Interviews Users Interviews Providers Interviews

Data from Futurelearn

A&U studies

CONCLUSIONS

Based on accessibility assessments and empirical investigations with stakeholder-groups:

To derive recommendations for accessible MOOCs

To develop guidance on how MOOCs can be more accessible

To provide the foundation for supporting those with disabilities to follow a route to open learning that meets their particular needs.

The current state of accessibility of MOOCs: What are the next steps? Francisco Iniesto

Supervisors : Patrick McAndrew, Shailey Minocha and Tim Coughlanfrancisco.iniesto@open.ac.uk