Skyline College was honored to have Dr. Luis Perez deliver a presentation on Universal Design and Accessibility in the iOS Environment on Wednesday September 23. Dr. Luis Pérez received his doctorate in special education from the University of South Florida and was selected as an Apple Distinguished Educator (ADE) in 2009. He is the author of Mobile Learning for All: Supporting Accessibility with the iPad, from Corwin Press.
Participants learned about the accessibility features that iOS9 and existing operating systems had to offer. In any Apple device, simply tap ‘General,’ and then ‘Accessibility’ to view all of the features. One amazing feature that was introduced for mobility was called ‘Switch Control.’ Switch Control allows the user to navigate through the iPhone screen by tapping a connected device that had two buttons.
Apple does its best to reach out to every type of user through a great concept called Universal Design (UD). Have you ever used Siri? Siri is an example of UD in Apple products that allows users to navigate through the phone via voice commands. With similar technology, Dr. Perez introduced an iPad app called ‘Book Creator.’ This powerful app allows the author the ability to utilize VoiceOver, which helps editing in Book Creator and when reading the books in iBooks. Dr. Perez’s presentation on Apple products and software has shown us the potential in broadening the scope of users and the impact of accessibility improvements in the iOS software that can benefit all.
The presentation was videotaped and will be available at the Center for Transformative Teaching and Learning (CTTL) in the coming weeks.
A full list of resources discussed during the presentation is available at the Universal Design & Accessibility website.
Article by Jonathan Paver & Liezl Madrona | Photo by Keisha Ford
