{"id":3406,"date":"2025-07-17T10:01:58","date_gmt":"2025-07-17T10:01:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.tamucet.org\/stepstone\/knowledgebase\/?post_type=knowledge_base&#038;p=3406"},"modified":"2026-07-24T17:48:23","modified_gmt":"2026-07-24T17:48:23","slug":"authoring-basics-applying-assistive-media-descriptions-for-screenreaders","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.tamucet.org\/stepstone\/knowledgebase\/authoring-basics-applying-assistive-media-descriptions-for-screenreaders\/","title":{"rendered":"Applying Assistive Media Descriptions for Screenreaders"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The StepStone Player will, within a supported screenreader configuration, contextually read\/announce <strong>captions<\/strong> (visible) and\/or <strong>assistive description<\/strong> (invisible, only &#8220;seen&#8221; by screenreaders) upon keyboard-navigated focus via <strong>Tab<\/strong> key presses and other applicable keyboard navigation cycles.<\/p>\n<p>Important usage\/behavior notes:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Captions are independent of assistive descriptions for each respective media element. A media element without a caption can have an assistive description applied, and vice versa.<\/li>\n<li>Captions are read before assistive descriptions if both are present.<\/li>\n<li>Non-launching media elements that do NOT have EITHER a caption OR assistive description are considered decorative, and are thus excluded from a screenreader&#8217;s Tab-focus cycle.<\/li>\n<li>Launchable media will still receive contextual Tab-key focus and announce that it is launchable even without a caption or assistive description present.<\/li>\n<li>Not all media provides a caption and\/or assistive description field for authoring. Background images, for example, are inherently decorative and do not offer these fields\/functionality.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>\nAuthors may apply <strong>assistive descriptions<\/strong> with the following procedure:<\/p>\n<p>1. Navigate to an applicable &#8220;media slot&#8221; in the Path Builder. Here, we are targeting a non-launching <strong>Primary\/Context<\/strong> image. As this is a non-launching media element, if neither a caption OR assistive description are applied, it will NOT receive keyboard Tab-focus from a screenreader (which may be the intended behavior, this is left to the Author&#8217;s preference\/intention!).  Locate the <strong>Assistive Description<\/strong> field for the media slot.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.tamucet.org\/stepstone\/knowledgebase\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/ssAssistiveDescScreen01.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"1066\" height=\"1179\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-3413\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.tamucet.org\/stepstone\/knowledgebase\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/ssAssistiveDescScreen01.png 1066w, https:\/\/www.tamucet.org\/stepstone\/knowledgebase\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/ssAssistiveDescScreen01-271x300.png 271w, https:\/\/www.tamucet.org\/stepstone\/knowledgebase\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/ssAssistiveDescScreen01-926x1024.png 926w, https:\/\/www.tamucet.org\/stepstone\/knowledgebase\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/ssAssistiveDescScreen01-768x849.png 768w, https:\/\/www.tamucet.org\/stepstone\/knowledgebase\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/ssAssistiveDescScreen01-710x785.png 710w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1066px) 100vw, 1066px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>2. Add the desired assistive description text (here, we have added &#8220;Activated Charcoal&#8221; for the description.). If caption text is also present, it is best practice that the assistive description only provide <em>additional<\/em> information that is not already present in the caption text. Consider providing any important narrative or descriptive details for the targeted media that may not otherwise be conveyed to a sight-impaired learner. In this case, it may be prudent to provide further details that better describe the image, such as &#8220;A syringe containing activated charcoal&#8221; or any other relevant information that may be helpful to the learner.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.tamucet.org\/stepstone\/knowledgebase\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/ssAssistiveDescScreen02.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"1066\" height=\"1179\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-3414\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.tamucet.org\/stepstone\/knowledgebase\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/ssAssistiveDescScreen02.png 1066w, https:\/\/www.tamucet.org\/stepstone\/knowledgebase\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/ssAssistiveDescScreen02-271x300.png 271w, https:\/\/www.tamucet.org\/stepstone\/knowledgebase\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/ssAssistiveDescScreen02-926x1024.png 926w, https:\/\/www.tamucet.org\/stepstone\/knowledgebase\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/ssAssistiveDescScreen02-768x849.png 768w, https:\/\/www.tamucet.org\/stepstone\/knowledgebase\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/07\/ssAssistiveDescScreen02-710x785.png 710w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 1066px) 100vw, 1066px\" \/><\/p>\n<p>3. Save the Path. <\/p>\n<div class=\"ssKB-tipBlock ssKB-tipBlock1\"><strong>Tip<\/strong>: To review assistive descriptions in a screenreader under &#8220;streamlined&#8221; StepStone Player deployment conditions, it is recommended to publish and package the Path into a Module, generate a SCORM package, and then observe the screenreader handling via this resulting SCORM package in a preferred LMS\/SCORM-hosting environment. This packaging\/review procedure will avoid having to navigate through the complex StepStone authoring interface via the screenreader\/keyboard, which may confuse the screenreader and result in insufficient screenreader-testing results.<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The StepStone Player will, within a supported screenreader configuration, contextually read\/announce captions (visible) and\/or assistive description (invisible, only &#8220;seen&#8221; by screenreaders) upon keyboard-navigated focus via Tab key presses and other applicable keyboard navigation cycles. Important usage\/behavior notes: Captions are independent of assistive descriptions for each respective media element. A media element without a caption can [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[42],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3406","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ada-accessibility"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tamucet.org\/stepstone\/knowledgebase\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3406","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tamucet.org\/stepstone\/knowledgebase\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tamucet.org\/stepstone\/knowledgebase\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tamucet.org\/stepstone\/knowledgebase\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tamucet.org\/stepstone\/knowledgebase\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3406"}],"version-history":[{"count":10,"href":"https:\/\/www.tamucet.org\/stepstone\/knowledgebase\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3406\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3901,"href":"https:\/\/www.tamucet.org\/stepstone\/knowledgebase\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3406\/revisions\/3901"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tamucet.org\/stepstone\/knowledgebase\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3406"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tamucet.org\/stepstone\/knowledgebase\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3406"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tamucet.org\/stepstone\/knowledgebase\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3406"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}