Calderdale CouncilAccessibility Guidance

Creating Accessible ContentStructure

Without structure, you just have a big pile of words.

It can make tasks hard for most people but impossible for some.

Headings

Headings break up content into organised sections.

They provide visual cues help people quickly scan and find information.

Headings range from level one to six. Level one is the root reserved for the document title. Each sub-heading level relates to the level above itself.

Think of heading structure like a family tree with parent, child and sibling relationships.

What to do

  • Organise

    Break content down into sections, if a section is longer than a few paragraphs, break it down more!

  • Style

    Headings should visually stand out. Use a combination of font size, weight, colour and family.

    There should be a visual hierarchy between heading levels. E.g. H3 smaller than H2.

  • Layout

    There should be visible space separating sections. Don't just hit enter several times, this inserts empty paragraphs. You should use the built in spacing properties.

  • Semantics

    A heading is not a heading until you make it one!

Semantics

Semantics are like hidden details that add meaning to information.

Computers process this hidden information and everybody benefits.

Benefits

  • Helps people with sight loss

    Someome with sight loss may use a

    screen-reader

    Screen-readers are software that can be installed on a digital device such as a computer. They read aloud content and provide many additional features that help people with vision impairment.

    Bitesize video: How do Screen Readers work?

    . This can provide a list of every heading and link on a page, announce how many items are in a list, rows in a table and much more.

    This gives somebody who can't see, access to a content overview and the ability to scan and jump to sections of interest.

  • Quick navigation and content generation

    Adobe Reader and Microsoft Word provide a navigation menu you can use to quickly jump to sections.

    In Word, you can collapse and expand entire sections of content or generate contents lists based on the heading structure.

  • Easy batch style updates

    Manage styles in one place. Say you want to add more space between sections, or change the colour of every heading. You only have to update 1 heading instead of every heading.

  • Search engine friendly

    Make your content easier to find by helping search engines understand the structure and relationship between your words.

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