Staff Site

Your Inclusive TD Summer Reading Club

July 26, 2022

How to make your program more accessible so that more kids will be encouraged to join

You can encourage more families to participate in your magical summer reading club activities by considering accessibility. Your efforts will pay off by letting your community know that your library provides a safe and inclusive space. You’ll also be encouraging whole new generations of kids to keep coming back to your library. Let’s explore the resources that will guide you on this quest to create a fun and inclusive summer reading club.

New accessibility video

We’d like you to meet Abby (age 12) and Isabelle (age 9), two of the stars of these new videos. They’ll tell you how much they love TDSRC, especially having access to books in audio and braille through their libraries. Not only will the videos convey how much an inclusive club means to kids like them, but the videos also provide good examples of video description and captioning. Enjoy!

TD Summer Reading Club – Accessibility

Club de lecture d’été TD – Accessibilité

 

Plan for Accessibility

The Plan for Accessibility page on the Staff Site has more resources than ever to make your clubs accessible. Here are some highlights:

·       Articles about audio-reading literacy and why audiobook collections in libraries are so important

·       Large-print, audio, braille, and OpenDyslexic font versions of the pre-reader and school-age notebooks

·       List of Recommended Reads from CELA’s collection and how to request them

·       Make Sure your Summer Reading Club is Accessible tip sheet for library staff

·       How to plan and deliver accessible programs

 

Online accessibility

You can increase the number of views and the participation rates for your online programs if you make it easy for kids and family members who use assistive technology to use your site. Not sure how to do this? You can start by following these tips:

·       Describe any text in videos that is not spoken aloud. Kids with vision loss can then watch your videos too! Use this Video Accessibility Checklist to help you get started.

·       Add alt text (alternative text) to provide a concise description of an image. Remember to caption images in social media as well. Find the steps to add alt text and other accessibility features across different platforms, including Instagram, YouTube and Facebook, in How to make your social media images accessible to everyone.

·       Add captions to videos. YouTube offers an automated “subtitles” feature so viewers who are deaf or hard of hearing can read the words as they are spoken.

·       You may need help with this next one. Ask your IT department and library system vendors about accessibility compliance. Your website (both the public and staff interfaces) should be built so that it is easy to navigate using a screen reader. While the information about web accessibility is vast, you can start by reading the requirements for making websites accessible under the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act (AODA): How to make your websites accessible

 

Kids and their families from your entire community will appreciate all your hard work to make your club inclusive. By learning and adapting, you will inspire them. Make your library the place to be this summer!