Best Practices for
AI-Enabled Inclusive EdTech Design

As a product leader, you often ask yourself these questions – Do you prioritize the user experience? Are you focused on avoiding costly lawsuits? Do you aim to maximize user adoption of your products? The answer to all of these questions, surely, is a resounding yes.

While product leaders mainly focus on answering these questions to make their product stand out, one area in which they very commonly falter is to make it fully accessible. The EdTech sector has revolutionized traditional learning methods and has grown significantly over the years. Yet, EdTech products often struggle with accessibility issues. For eg – inadequate text alternatives, poor keyboard navigation, and limited customizable interfaces can hinder usability and inclusiveness. Additionally, implementing features like screen reader compatibility, adaptable interfaces, and conducting audits can be challenging as well, requiring significant time and resources.

To bridge this gap, AI-enabled inclusive edtech design is highly effective in addressing these challenges. AI can enhance keyboard navigation, automate the generation of text alternatives, and personalize the user interface. This reduces the manual effort required to meet accessibility standards and continuously monitor and flag compliance issues, ensuring that products remain up-to-date with changing regulations.

In edtech, accessibility is key to ensuring no student is left behind, making it essential for creating an inclusive learning environment. Hence, creating AI-enabled inclusive design will allow product leaders to not only streamline the development process but also create and develop more inclusive and user-friendly educational tools. But that’s not it, there’s more to consider when it comes to accessibility.

 

The POUR Principles of Accessibility

The core principles of accessibility revolve around creating inclusive environments that enable all individuals irrespective of their abilities or disabilities, to access and engage with information and services effectively. The Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) consist of four main principles to help developers create content with accessibility in mind. These principles are stated as follows:

1. Perceivable

The first principle emphasizes the importance of presenting content in ways that all users can perceive i.e. understand, regardless of their sensory abilities. When it comes to edtech products, this means ensuring that visual information is also accessible to users who are hard of hearing by providing transcripts or subtitles.

It also ensures the creation of content that can be presented differently without losing information or structure. Adhering to the perceivable principle, EdTech product leaders can create more inclusive learning environments for all students.

2. Operable

The operable principle states that the user interface components and navigation must be operable i.e. all users should be able to navigate and interact with the interface without facing any challenges. Here, operability means ensuring that users can navigate using a keyboard alone if they cannot use a mouse.

It also involves managing focus control so that the users can navigate through the content logically. Navigation buttons, accessible forms, and interactive elements serve as crucial factors as they must be easy to operate without confusion. EdTech products that can give control over timing elements, such as extending time limits, ensure that everyone has an equal opportunity to engage with the educational content.

3. Understandable

The “U” in the POUR principle stands for understandable, i.e. it ensures that information and operations of the user interface are understandable. It means using clear, simple language that avoids jargon, and making educational material accessible to a wide audience. It should also provide instructions and feedback in multiple formats (Eg – text, visual, audio) to accommodate different learning styles.

This helps EdTech product leaders create intuitive and user-friendly experiences catering to learners of all backgrounds and allowing them to engage with the content confidently and effectively.

4. Robust

For EdTech products, robustness means ensuring that educational tools work seamlessly with various assistive technologies and the ability to quickly adapt to future advancements. It involves adhering to coding standards, using proper semantic markup, and maximizing compatibility with different browsers and devices.

This involves regular testing and updates essential to maintain compatibility and accessibility over time. Building a robust platform can provide an inclusive learning experience, benefit users with disabilities, and contribute to the overall longevity of the EdTech solution.

Understanding these core principles helps in designing the edtech tools better. Yet, the true challenge lies in incorporating these principles into practice. Implementing best practices to incorporate these principles is crucial for achieving true accessibility.

 

5 Best Practices To Incorporate Accessibility into Digital Products

For EdTech leaders, their main priority is to create an inclusive and user-friendly design, accessible by all. Using these best practices, they can create educational tools that can make a difference for all learners.

Accessible AI-Generated Content

The significance of creating accessible ai-generated content lies in its potential to break down barriers that learners with disabilities face. This involves using AI to generate text alternatives for images, captions for videos, and readable formats for various assistive technologies. Using these technologies, content creation speeds up and improves the overall quality and accessibility of educational resources.

However, edtech companies should also remain cautious about potential pitfalls like the accuracy of the AI content and the need for human intervention to ensure compliance with accessibility standards. Talking about the future, AI will help product leaders refine their approaches and incorporate user feedback to enhance the effectiveness of the product.

Regular Usability Testing with Diverse Groups

Regular usability testing becomes essential as it helps educational tools meet the varied needs of all users. It helps identify usability barriers that can affect learners with disability and helps build a more inclusive design.

Previously, usability testing often lacked diversity and focused on a narrow base that could not fully represent the broader range of potential users. Today, AI can optimize this process by facilitating remote and unmoderated testing, helping a broader range of people provide feedback effectively.

While AI can optimize and enhance the testing process it should not replace real-world testing with diverse user groups. Incorporating AI into usability testing should focus on continuous learning from real user data, adapting to evolving accessibility standards, and ensuring that AI tools themselves are accessible.

Integration with Assistive Technology

For product leaders aiming to create inclusive learning environments, integration with assistive technology is a vital best practice. Earlier integration with assistive technologies was an afterthought as these technologies were frequently added as separate, standalone features rather than being directly integrated into the core design of the product.

Since the time AI has entered the picture, product manufacturing has been revolutionized. It can continuously learn from user interactions and enhance the effectiveness of speech-to-text and text-to-speech features over time. This not only speeds up the development process but also ensures that the assistive technologies evolve to meet the needs of a diverse user base.

Automated and Manual Accessibility Testing Tools

Automated and manual accessibility testing tools allow product leaders to offer a comprehensive approach to identifying and addressing potential accessibility barriers. Automated testing tools can quickly scan for common issues, such as missing alt text or improper keyboard navigation, providing immediate feedback and allowing for rapid adjustments. On the other hand, manual testing offers a more detailed evaluation, focusing on the user experience and capturing subtleties that automated tools might miss.

Earlier, this approach was not only labor-intensive but also limited in scope and often missed complex issues that could affect user experience. Using AI-powered automated tools and along with manual testing ensures that accessibility is thoroughly assessed from both a technical and a human perspective. This way edtech product leaders can maintain high accessibility standards that accommodate the needs of all students.

Adherence to Established Accessibility Guidelines

Adherence to guidelines becomes a fundamental best practice for all product leaders. This includes following guidelines like WCAG and ADA are crucial as they provide a standardized framework to ensure digital products are accessible to users with disabilities.

With AI, product leaders can significantly optimize this process which often relies on manual interpretation and implementation as these tools can quickly identify areas where a product may fall short, offering real-time suggestions for improvement. This helps product leaders to speed up the compliance process and stay updated with the latest accessibility standards as they evolve.

EdTech product leaders can now create more inclusive and effective educational tools following these best practices. By leveraging  AI and adhering to established accessibility guidelines, they can streamline the development process, ensuring that all learners have equal access to educational content.

As AI evolves, it opens the doors for EdTech leaders to craft more personalized, adaptive, and accessible learning experiences that can better meet the diverse requirements of a broader audience. If you are looking to partner with a good brand that can help you reshape the way people look at education, you’re on the right page. Contact us today!