Post on 14-Dec-2015
Closed Captioning Matters: An Examination of the Use of Captioning for All Students
Lyman Dukes IIICasey Frechette
University of South Florida St. Petersburg
Session Objectives
• Discuss Legislation Impacting Captioning• Discuss Literature on Captioning• Discuss One Institution’s Experience with
Captioning• Discuss Your Experiences with Captioning• Discuss Conclusions and Next Steps
Project Background
• Students are selecting online courses
If given a choice, which course type would you rather take?Face-to-face 32%Hybrid 27%Online 41%
I would like to see more online courses available at USFSP.
Yes, definitely 68%
Neutral 29%
No, we seem to have enough 3%
Project Background
• Online course offerings are on the increase• Captioning is provided per accommodation
request• Court rulings appear to indicate otherwise• The institution’s Accessibility Committee
initiated a pilot study to examine the cost and benefit of captioning all online course video content
Goals of the Study
• Do students use captions, if included in online course video content?
• If students use captioning, do students indicate benefit from the use of captions included in online course video content?
• If benefit is noted, what benefits do students report?• Is there benefit for other campus constituents?• What are the typical costs for captioning online
course video content?
Legislation says
• Section 508 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973, requires that electronic and information technologies are accessible to persons with disabilities if procured, developed, maintained, or used by federal agencies.
(Burgstahler, 2002)
Legislation says
• Title II of the ADA requires that communications with persons with disabilities must be as effective as communications with others.– The OCR indicated ‘as effective as’ includes:• Timeliness of delivery• Accuracy of the translation• Provision of content in a manner and medium appropriate
to the message significance and ability of the individual(OCR, 2003)
Legislation says
• The DOJ takes the position that the ADA applies to online communication.– The DOJ stated: “Covered entities under the ADA are
required to provide effective communication regardless of whether they generally communicate through print media, audio media, or computerized media such as the Internet. Covered entities that use the Internet for communications regarding their programs, goods, or services must be prepared to offer those communications through accessible means as well.” (Patrick, 1996)
Office of Civil Rights says
• “The courts have held that a public entity violates its obligations under the ADA when it only responds on an ad-hoc basis to individual requests for accommodation”
(Distance Education Accessibility Guidelines Task Force, 2011, p. 9)
In sum
• Access does not equal compliance, but effectiveness of the access – timeliness, accuracy, and appropriateness – must be addressed. (Carnevale, 1999)
Court Rulings say
• A recent ruling impacting several California institutions has been interpreted to mean all audio and video content must be captioned prior to being made available.
Court Rulings say
• Other charges relative to online course accessibility have been brought against:– Northwestern University– New York University– Penn State University– Louisiana Tech University– Florida State University
Our Position, not necessarily the position of the Institution
• It’s the most ethical approach – A course experience should be the same for students with or without a disability
• Universal Design approaches should be applied whenever reasonable and appropriate
• Improving access may improve student success and retention rate
• We are legally obliged
The Evolution of Captioning
• 1972 – Open captioning was used in TV programming for the first time in the U.S.
• 1976 – FCC approved closed captioning• Captioning is now commonplace in the TV environment• Literature on distance education often addresses ‘access’
however, often not in terms of persons with disabilities• Distance education faces a journey similar to that of
captioning for TV
(Carroll & McLaughlin, 2005)
The Evolution of Distance Learning
• Correspondence Courses • Televised Courses • E-mail driven online courses • Web-based online courses
(Burgstahler, 2002)
Literature Says
• For Students Diagnosed– Students with hearing impairments most often
report issues with the inaccessibility of audio/video material (Fichten et al., 2009)
• Students with disabilities face a ‘second digital divide’ (Burgstahler, 2002)
• Visual text alternatives for audio information and complex sentence structures are barriers (Lang & Steely, 2003)
Literature Says
• For Students not Diagnosed– ‘Provides an additional level of comprehensive
input when learning a new language’ – ‘Yielded more positive attitudes and improved
vocabulary’– ‘Improved vocabulary, reading comprehension,
word analysis skills, and increased motivation in a remedial reading course’
Literature Says
• For Students not Diagnosed– Students in a foreign language course indicated
they used captions to:• Increase attention• Improve language processing• Reinforce previous knowledge• Analyze the language
– Students in Science• ‘Low performers’ used captions to achieve scores
similar to ‘high-performers’
Method
• Research Setting– USFSP is part of the USF system and has
approximately 6,500 full- and part-time students– We are an urban campus in downtown St.
Petersburg– In typical semesters approximately 25% of our SCH
is generated thru online courses
Method
• Courses: Law and Business I / Introduction to Psychology
• Module content: Full Length Lecture Capture Method – Instructor and any presentation visual on screen
• Module Lecture Length:– Law and Business I – 99 minutes– Introduction to Psychology – 108 minutes
• Setting: Lectures filmed in distance learning studio with a live audience of 32 students in each course
Method
• All videos delivered via VideoJS, an open-source HTML5 video player
• Advantages– Place captions below videos– Customize font for maximum readability– Provide option to turn captions off– Provide other playback controls– Option to track student interactions with controls
Method
• Captions were enabled by default• Captions could be copied and pasted• Videos appeared at a size of 720x440 but
could be made full screen
Instruments
• 12-item survey administered at the end of the semester– Perceived extent of caption usage– Attitudes toward captioning– Other experiences with closed captioning– Disability status
Quantitative Analysis
• Categorical data were tabulated and descriptive statistics were calculated– Portion of students with self-identified disabilities– Perceived helpfulness of captions– Perceived extent of caption usage
Qualitative Analysis
• Open-ended responses to how captions helped or hurt were coded using the Glaser-Strauss constant comparison method (1967)
– 56 responses, from three to 63 words in length– Comments were categorized by comparing
remarks to existing “good fits”– Properties that defined categories were identified
to turn “collections” into “constructs” (Lindlof, 1995)
Discussion
86%
13%
1%
How Students Reported Their Disability Status
No Reported Disability (86%)Reported & Not Regis-tered with Disability Services (13%)Reported & Registered with Disability Services (1%)
Discussion
49%
35%
10%
5%
1%
How Helpful Students Found Closed Captioning
Extremly helpful (49%)Very helpful (35%)Moderately helpful (10%)Slightly helpful (5%)Not helpful (1%)
Discussion
67%
15%
10%
2%6%
How Often Students Used Closed Captioning
Always (67%)Often (15%)Sometimes (10%)Seldom (2%)Never (6%)
Discussion
• Student BenefitClarification• Students sometimes had difficulty hearing the
instructor.– “Closed captions helped me because I was able to read and
process what was being said a little easer.”– “I used it in case I missed something the instructor said, I
could pause and still see what was said.”– “I was able to see exactly what the professor was saying …”
Discussion
• Student BenefitComprehension• Students treated captions as a core delivery method,
not just a supplement to the audio content– “They made the information easier to learn because I am
more of a visual learner”– “The closed captions helped me when viewing the videos at
home, because I have small children and at times they can be loud.”
– “The closed captions helped me because it’s not my first language.”
Discussion
• Student BenefitSpelling of Keywords• Students appreciated seeing the spelling of unfamiliar
words– “If the professor said a word I didn’t understand I’d go back
and read the caption.”– “There were many legal terms that I did not know of and the
captions helped me learn how to spell them.”– “It helped me spell certain words that were important in the
lecture.”
Discussion
• Student BenefitNote Taking• Students reported using captions as a note taking tool
– “They helped because when I was taking notes I was able to pause the video and use the captions rather than rewind and repeat the video.”
– “It was extremely helpful and I took tons of notes.”– “I could pause and just copy the caption.”
Discussion
• Student BenefitOther Potential Benefits … but don’t quote us!• Business Law I – Student course grades with closed
captioning were slightly higher than without• Introduction to Psychology – Student course grades
with closed captioning were more than 7% higher than without
Discussion
• Student Hindrance– Three students reported seeing words that ran
together without spaces– Two additional students cited accuracy issues with
the captions
Discussion
• Faculty Benefit – Law and Business I – Student evaluations ratings
increased in 8 of 8 categories– Introduction to Psychology – Student evaluation
ratings increased in 6 of 8 categories
Discussion
• Faculty Benefit– One of the instructors stated “I was thrilled to be
able to offer the on/off captioning option to my students. I really liked that the students could turn off the captioning option if they found it distracting. I have had several students tell me that they like the closed-captioning feature.”
Discussion
• Institutional Benefit– Improved course satisfaction among students– Improved student success– Improved retention rates
Discussion
• Cost Analysis– $150 per hour for transcription / provision of
caption and transcript files• Other vendors had similar rates
Discussion
• Other Options– Speech-to-Text Software• Examples
– Dragon Naturally Speaking– Camtasia speech-to-text capability
– Captionist Position• Approximately $42,000 per year / $20 per hour
Conclusions
• Educate Administrators• Educate and Train Professors• Educate and Train Students• Develop and Adopt e-learning / accessibility
Guidelines• Convene a campus accessibility committee• Further Research
Please share your experiences with captioning at your institution
and ask any questions you may have.
References• Burgstahler, S. (2002). Distance Learning: Universal Design, Universal Access.
AACE Journal, 10(1), 32-61. Norfolk, VA: AACE.• Carnevale, D. (1999, October 29). Colleges strive to give disabled students
access to on-line courses. Chronicle of Higher Education, 46(10), Retrieved May 22, 2014, from http://chronicle.com/article/Colleges-Strive-to-Give/13474
• Carrol, J., McLaughlin, K. (2005). Closed captioning in distance education, Journal of Computing Sciences in Colleges, Vol. 20, Issue 4, 183 – 189.
• Distance Education Accessibility Guidelines Task Force. California Community Colleges, (2011). Distance education accessibility guidelines for students with disabilities. Retrieved from website: http://www.grossmont.edu/accessibility/docs/Distance_Education_Accessibility_Guidelines_2011.pdf
• Fichten, C.S., Ferraro, V., Asuncion, J.V., Chwojka, C., Barile, M., Nguyen, M.N., Klomp, R. & Wolforth, J. (2009). Disabilities and e-Learning Problems and Solutions: An Exploratory Study. Educational Technology & Society, 12(4), 241-256.
References• Glaser, B. G., & Strauss, A. L. (1967). The discovery of grounded
theory: Strategies for qualitative research. Chicago: Aldine.• Lang, H.G. & Steely, D. (2003). Web-Based Science Instruction for
Deaf Students: What Research Says to the Teacher. Instructional Science: An International Journal of the Learning Sciences, 31(4), 277.
• Lindof, T. R. (). Qualitative communication research methods. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.
• Patrick, D. US Department of Justice, Civil Rights Division. Letter of September 9, 1996 addressed to to senator tom harkin of iowa. Retrieved from website: http://www.justice.gov/crt/foia/readingroom/frequent_requests/ada_tal/tal712.txt
Thank you very much for sharing your time with us.
ldukes@usfsp.edufrechette@usfsp.edu