Gaining Support through Empathy & Awareness Exercises #CSUN15

#CSUN15 @patrickdunphy

Photo: David Garcia Project

Gain Support WithEmpathy & Awareness Exercises

Who Am I?

I work for CBC

From the Rock

I live here

I co-lead #a11yTO

Roll Call

The real

Beginning

The

Beginning

My Accessibility Journey

The

Present

Empathy (Merriam-Webster)

the action of understanding, being aware of, being

sensitive to, and vicariously experiencing the

feelings, thoughts, and experience of another of

either the past or present without having the

feelings, thoughts, and experience fully

communicated in an objectively explicit manner;

also : the capacity for this

Empathy (Merriam-Webster)

the action of understanding, being aware of, being

sensitive to, and vicariously experiencing the

feelings, thoughts, and experience of another of

either the past or present without having the

feelings, thoughts, and experience fully

communicated in an objectively explicit manner;

also : the capacity for this

Empathy

Accessibility is about understanding people and the

barriers that they face

Getting your own experience of accessibility helps

you to put yourself in the shoes of others and keep

accessibility in mind when building and testing your

sites and applications

Credit: @dotjay

Empathy Workshop

in a nutshell

Perform predefined tasks on own site using

specific techniques as a means to provide

insight to the difficulties users face and the

frustration they feel as a result.

Preparation is Key

• Know your content

• Pre-screen your selections

• Select difficult or impossible tasks

• Don’t let participants cheat

Perform Common Tasks

• Find out tomorrow’s temperature

• Score of last nights Blue Jays game

• Set photo gallery in full screen mode

• Access the member registration form

• Replay last nights newscast

Workshop Guide

1. Assign participants numbers

2. Assign simulations numbers

3. Perform corresponding tasks (2)

4. Reassign numbers in step 2

5. Perform additional tasks

6. Repeat until all have tried at least 1

task using each technique

Simulations

1. Keyboard only access

2. Fine Motor Control

3. Gross Motor Control

4. Low vision

Other Possibilities

• Chrome Zoom Plugin

• Colourblindness

• NVDA / VoiceOver

• Invert mouse w/non-dominant hand

• Straw Test

• Suggestions?

$10 DIY Empathy Kit

4. Low

Vision

3. Gross

Motor

Control

2. Fine

Motor

Control

1. Keyboard

(not pictured)

Encourage Discussion

“After all my years in project management, I

finally understand what accessibility means.”

“This is so frustrating.”

“I thought this was going to be an easy task.”

“This is a problem. How do we fix this?”

Workshop Goals

1. Want participants to experience

frustration

2. Change how participants think

about accessibility

Questions / Comments?

Thank You.

#CSUN15 @patrickdunphy