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Digital accessibility: Writing

A guide for students, teachers, support staff and anyone else with an interest in digital accessibility

Writing and organising

The technology for writing and organising listed on this page is often free or built into the device. Use these tools and tips to create content in a way that suits your ability and to make your documents and presentations more readable by everyone.

To listen to this page on a PC or laptop, open it in Microsoft Edge and tap the Read Aloud button in the browser address bar or tap the three dots to open the browser menu and select Read Aloud.

Outline in Word for planning

Make online mindmaps with Xmind

Mind maps for Apple

Grammarly

Speedy typing apps

Google Docs

Proofread your work

It can be much easier to hear where there are mistakes rather than reading them.

Accessibility checkers

Microsoft 365 apps

Use the Accessibility Checker in Word

  •     Click the Review tab on the ribbon.
  •     Click the "Check Accessibility” icon. (Or in the Tools menu, click Check Accessibility.)

In the pane that appears beside your document, you see a list of accessibility issues. Click an issue to highlight it in your document.The accessibility checker will suggest how to fix the problem you’ve selected.

Note: This is one of the videos in the Accessibility video training from Microsoft. Click the link below for more videos.

Acrobat Pro

Canvas LMS

The Rich Content Editor in Canvas includes an accessibility checker that detects common accessibility errors within the editor.
This tool only verifies content created within the Rich Content Editor.
Look for the web accessibility icon (stick figure of a human) directly underneath the editor window. Click on the web accessibility icon to launch the accessibility checker.

Microsoft 365 apps

Click on the desired application in the menu to use the online version. It is also possible to install the office applications on your device. You can do this by clicking on "Install apps" in the top right corner of the website and then on "Microsoft 365 apps".

Do you know about a great app?