Designing for Accessibility: The Intersection of Instructional Design and Disability

The authors of this chapter note the different meaning and process of access in their two disciplines: instructional design, and education of persons with disabilities. They reviewed the professional literature to better understand the intersection of these disciplines. Using search terms such as access, instructional design, disabled, handicapped, and technology, the authors identified peer reviewed articles published between 2012 and 2018. They targeted academic journals written in English from any country, as well as journals associated with the instructional design profession, and the disability education profession. Commonalities and differences in research focus, methods, participants, and results are included. Although the context of the research was broad and varied, these organizational themes emerged: persons with disabilities, educational technology, Universal Design for Learning (UDL), inclusive classrooms, adult learners, accommodations and intervention, training and professional development, collaboration, and using instructional design to facilitate access to and through technology. This chapter expounds on the nature of, and benefits and challenges of, this type of interdisciplinary collaboration. Further, it brings to bear the importance of a collaborative approach when designing learning experiences for a target population while also giving attention to individual learner needs across contexts. The results of this review of relevant literature support the authors’ understanding that inclusive instructional design that provides all people access to, and through, educational technology is both complicated and complex, and requires a interdisciplinary team approach.