A nuanced understanding of disability is a key factor to ensure effective accessibility practices and engage learners in their learning. Challenging disability stereotypes and negative assumptions is an essential part of developing learners’ disability awareness. For teachers of digital accessibility, strategies to challenge stereotypes underpin progressive teaching approaches and course components such as lectures [LINK/Task] and project work [LINK/Task].
For some students, personal interest and motivation in accessibility is prompted and mediated by personal experiences and close relationships with disabled people, such as friends and family members (Tseng et al., 2022), and this understanding can be harnessed for learning. However, our research suggests many learners have little experience of interacting with people with disabilities, particularly groups who are excluded from mainstream education or work. As such, there is a tendency for learners hold negative preconceptions of disability and disabled people. These may relate to tragic, individualist or ablist assumptions, negative stereotypes that can result in exclusionary design practices.
Conversely, the lives and achievements of disabled people can be also objectified in ways that are commonly referred to as ‘inspiration porn’ (Young, 2012), or what Billy Gregory referred to as ‘weaponized empathy’:
“the more we celebrate someone being courageous for overcoming a disability and living their life that way, it diminishes who the person really is.”
Billy Gregory, Accessibility Project Manager, Ubisoft, Canada
Educators deploy various strategies to challenge learner assumptions and stereotypes. Often, teachers show or demonstrate positive perspectives of disabled people as independent and empowered citizens.
In some cases, this can be demonstrated by teachers who themselves identify as having a disability [tactic: personalising disability], or inviting guest speakers with disabilities, disability user groups, or creating learning environments where learners’ co-work directly with disabled people [task: working with disabled people].
Learners benefit from engaging directly with people who have lived experience of disability. Cao and Loiacono (2022) highlight the effectiveness of learning opportunities that cultivate personal meaning for students.
“There is no room for stereotyping when you’re working with a human being whose name you know, who you have a relationship with. It’s just not possible. You can’t run away from requirements. You can’t avoid some constraint.
Amy Ko, Professor, University of Washington, Seattle, USA
Challenging assumptions and stereotypes links to transformational learning approaches, and the use of critical models of disability in teaching, and disability awareness as a threshold concept for accessibility education. Explore these approaches and pedagogic terms, if you have not already encountered them.
Video and audio resources
Strategies in practice: Bringing in guest speakers, disabled groups and giving students direct experience working with disabled people is widely considered the gold standard for transforming student attitudes to disability. For educators who have limited resources and time, and are not able to include direct engagement with disabled people, many draw on videos and other resources that can show people using – and talking about how they use – computers and assistive technology.
Key terms
- ‘Ablism’ and ‘Technoablism’
- Ableism, Technoableism, and Future AI: A. Shew, 2020.
- ‘Inspiration Porn’
Resources
- Linking to Learning Objectives
- Linking to Curricula
References
Cao & Loiacono (2021). Perceptions of web accessibility guidelines by student website and app developers. Behaviour & Info Tech, 41(12), 2616–2634.
Tseng, Jung, Elglaly, Liu & Ludi (2022) Exploration on Integrating Accessibility into an AI Course. ‘SIGCSE 2022. Vol. 1. ACM. NY, USA, 864–870.
Further Reading
Taylor, E. (2000). Fostering Mezirow’s Transformative Learning Theory in the Adult Education Classroom: A Critical Review. Canadian Journal for the Study of Adult Education, 14(2), 1–28.