MS PowerPoint is a complete presentation tool that can integrate text, graphics, animations, multimedia and other interactive elements in one package and is generally used for live presenations. PowerPoint has become ubitiquous in education and integrates with Learning Management Systems and other classroom technologies.
Strength of PowerPoint
- Space to organize discussion points for presentation or instruction
- Easy to create and present outline of discussion, surveys or other polling instruments
- Easy to customize visual presentation of content (design and layout)
- Integrates graphics and animations
- Manages multimedia and other richmedia
- Provides a space for additional notes and other relevant information
- Can create links to other content
- Integrates with most presentation and and learning management technologies
PowerPoints slides are natively accessible to most functional limitations and when authored appropiately, they are accessible users of screen readers.
Accessibility Consideration with PowerPoint Presentations
- Content:
- Reading order: PowerPoint places content in text boxes. Screen readers perceive the content in order the text boxes are created and not how they appear visually on the slide
- Design: Ability to use different fonts, background and foreground colors, hues and images can create visual “noise” making the slides difficult to read
- Non-textual elements: Information from images and other multimedia without text descriptors or captions cannot be perceived by blind and hearing impaired
- Multimedia: Online, most media files are not integrated with presentation file and require a separate download of the player.
- Autoshapes: are like text boxes and have similar issues with read order
- Tables: Complex and inappropriately created tables are not accessible to screen readers
- Navigation: Automatic progression, custom animations and other features used for emphasis, presentation timing, or aesthetics with minimal user control.
- Transition: Automatic builds and transitions (show progressively more information as presentation proceeds) causes the screen to refresh, forcing the screen reader to read from the top of slide.
- Interoperability with learning technologies: Learning management systems and online presentation tools convert the PowerPoint slides into images which are functionally not accessible.
- Distribution: PowerPoint slides require full version of PowerPoint or a PowerPoint Viewer. PowerPoint viewer does not give the user the ability to manipulate the content. When distributed online they can be best viewed using IE.
- Web conversion: Web conversion is difficult and imprecise. Files are displayed in a set of frames with missing or inaccurate names and titles
