I am currently ensconced in a pit of marking. I am making my way to the surface and can almost see the light above but still a way to go! Whilst I joke about this it is something I find exceedingly difficult and can only do thanks to Zoe Gilchrist and Angie O'Keefe coming up with a workaround for me. Within my School we mark online using Turnitin Studio - which from an accessibility perspective is much better than the previous version. Students submit their work online, paperless system, and they receive their marks and feedback the same way. It is a good system - but not great from an accessibility perspective. I cannot read the essays (I can only read for a brief amount of time before the symptoms of chronic migraine kick in) and usually use TextHelp ReadWrite Gold to read all documents to me. The PDF aloud add in is excellent. I then write using dictation and have a very friendly dragon from nuance. These systems work very effectively and keep me functional. Having realised that these systems did not work with Grademark I used to spend a long time and feel very ill as I tried to mark to the deadlines. I clearly wasn't very creative but happened to mention the difficulties to Angie when I took part in her PhD study. She instantly started thinking of solutions and within a few days she and Zoe had a workaround for me. I haven't looked back. So for anyone having similar issues here is how I do it. Once you have the folder of assignments open you need to download each one. They will be downloaded as PDF documents but will not be readable. You then open them in nuance PDF converter. A pop up menu asks what you want to do with the document and you select make this document fully readable. Once it has done this save the document and you now have something that ReadWrite Gold can read. To mark an essay and give online feedback I open the assignment submitted to Turnitin and the readable PDF document and split my screen in 2. This means both are quite small but it is workable with a large screen. I listen to the PDF version and follow the words on the Turnitin version. This is where the new Turnitin Studio helps. If I want to make a comment I click on the screen and you can choose to write a comment or choose one of your QuickMark comments (before you had to open the sidebar to do this which made everything tricky). If I just want to use a QuickMark comment I don't pause the reading. If I want to write a comment or add something I pause the reading whilst I do this. So using my dragon... The way that dragon works depends on the web browser you are using. With Google dragon allows you to dictate straight into the comment boxes. But needs you to click between the 2 open windows (for pausing and scrolling etc). Edge brings up the dragon dictation box when you start to dictate and then needs you to copy the text and paste it into the comment box. Normally you can say transfer and it will automatically transfer the text into the programme but in Edge it all just disappears - very frustrating!. But Edge recognises which window you are in without clicking so I have less issues with scrolling the PDF document by accident and losing where it is speaking. Pros and cons to both. Whilst this might sound a little clunky and it is time consuming it means I can mark. So what have I learnt?
Thank you Angie and Zoe. Now back to the marking...
2 Comments
24/2/2017 02:27:53 pm
Thanks fior highlighting these "workarounds" for Turnitin and demonstrating how you use assistive technology.
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Kirsten Huby
27/2/2017 07:57:48 am
Thanks for the tip Kerry I'll have a look at Medincle
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AuthorKirsten Huby Lecturer Child Nursing interested in blended learning, educational technology and improving student engagement. Archives
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