According to the University of Washington's DO-IT Knowledge Base (2014), assistive technology (AT) is "technology used by individuals with disabilities in order to perform functions that might otherwise be difficult or impossible." There are many types of assistive technologies including screen readers, voice recognition software, and even special keyboards that have large keys or are designed for use with one hand. This page focuses on those used most often by Penn State students.

Who Uses AT?

While people with disabilities rely on their AT to do everyday tasks, many people like to use features that allow them to customize their experience, such as printing lesson pages to read and mark up by hand, viewing the font at a larger size, or hearing the text on a web page or in a document read aloud, with or without visual highlighting. Penn State has adopted tools such as Canvas, Office 365, and the Google Suite that have all sorts of built-in accessibility features, as well as software designed to assist with learning like Read & Write Gold that may be beneficial to all students. Accessible design means the content works with different types of AT and takes advantage of any built-in features provided by the course technology and materials. This module will educate about the types of AT students use, whether personal to them, Penn State provided, or built into the software we use.

Types of Assistive Technology

Screen Readers

Screen readers, assistive technology used by people who are blind or have low vision, read aloud the text on a web page and provide keyboard options for navigating applications, websites, and page elements. Basically, this software will allow anyone the full use of their computer without the need for a monitor or a mouse...provided everything has been designed accessibly of course.

Screen readers are designed to recognize HTML elements such as headings, links, lists, tables, alternative image text (alt text), math code, and most punctuation, which is why formatting those elements correctly is so important—those HTML elements are what enable screen reader users to make sense of a page.

JAWS logo

JAWS is the most popular and the most expensive screen reader. It is sometimes used in conjunction with a refreshable Braille display.

Watch this video to see Michelle McManus from the IT Accessibility Team at University Park use JAWS and VoiceOver on her phone to do everyday tasks, including reading course content in Canvas.

Screen Reader Demo Video

Video Length: 00:09:01 Michelle McManus using JAWS and VoiceOver

Activity: Try a Screen Reader

The free NVDA for Windows (NonVisual Desktop Advisor) screen reader is offered by a company call NV Access. You can download NVDA from their website, and also check out their NVDA user guide to learn essential keyboard commands and more. It is the second most popular after JAWS and has similar functionality. WebAIM's annual screen reader survey provides more details if you are interested.

VoiceOver is a screen reader that comes with every Apple device including Macs, iPhones, and iPads. It can be turned on or off by going into the Accessibility menu under settings.

screenshot of the accessibility settings on a mac with a focus on the voice over enable button — Mac Voiceover Setting

There is a built-in tutorial that explains the keyboard commands and touch controls required to use it, but Apple also provides some additional documentation on their website. Check out the VoiceOver user guide for more information.

Magnification

ZoomText is one of the most popular magnification applications with text-to-speech capabilities used by people with low vision. MAGic is another popular screen magnification tool created by Freedom Scientific, the same people who created JAWS. Read more about both tools on their websites.

Read Aloud and Other Tools

There are a number of other types of assistive technology, including free tools like the Immersive Reader and Read & Write Gold which can be used to read documents and web pages aloud, customize the way text looks on a page, and even aid in studying with features like a picture dictionary and parts of speech highlighter. You can learn more about these tools and how to access them in the Resources module.

Resources

For a full list of AT, see the Adaptive Technology and Services page for the Assistive Technology Lab in the Penn State Library.

References

University of Washington DO-IT Knowledge Base. (2014, February 26). What is assistive technology? http://www.washington.edu/doit/what-assistive-technology

Updated October, 2024