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Cited by 21Teaching and Learning ProgrammingDigital Accessibility for DisabilitiesAssistive Technology in Communication and Mobility

Accessible to Whom? Bringing Accessibility to Blocks

Open access
Stefik, Andreas, Allee, Willliam, Contreras, Gabriel, Kluthe, Timothy, Hoffman, Alex, Blaser, Brianna, Ladner, Richard·2024·Proceedings of the 55th ACM Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education V. 1
DOI 10.1145/3626252.3630770
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Abstract

The introduction of block-based programming has gradually changed the landscape of programming education, particularly for school children. Block languages today, however, have serious technical barriers to students with disabilities. For example, block languages are generally not screen reader accessible, incompatible with braille, and contain serious problems for users with motor impairments. No student with a disability should ever be denied access to learning computer science and they do not have to be. To help rectify this, we present a new approach to the design of block languages called Quorum Blocks. Quorum Blocks uses a custom hardware accelerated graphical rendering pipeline that takes into account how screen readers and other devices work under the hood. We discuss these technical details and demonstrate that accessibility support can be fully achieved without meaningfully losing either the look of modern blocks or their visual output. We present the results from focus groups that highlight the barriers students faced with a variety of disabilities when using the first version of Quorum Blocks. We focus especially on challenges with low vision users, screen reader users, or those using no mouse and only one hand to type. Block languages built using either our techniques, or on top of our libraries, would become accessible out of the box.

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Cited by

Sorted by citations

Authors
Stefik, A., Allee, W., Contreras, G., Kluthe, T., Hoffman, A., Blaser, B., & Ladner, R.
Affiliations
  • University of Nevada, Las Vegas (US)
  • University of Washington (US)
ORCID
Venue
Proceedings of the 55th ACM Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education V. 1
Publisher
ACM
Published
2024-03-07
Pages
1286-1292
DOI
10.1145/3626252.3630770
OpenAlex
W4392564874
Cited by
21
References
1
Citations by year
2026: 9 · 2025: 7 · 2024: 5
FWCI
9.21
Type
conference paper
Language
en
Open access
Licence
www.acm.org/publications/policies/copyright_policy#Background (vor)
Locations
ACM Technical Symposium on Computer Science Education (SIGCSE) (publishedVersion)
Funders
National Science Foundation (2121993, 2122189, 2106392 and 2048356)
Topics
  • Physical Sciences › Computer Science › Computer Science Applications › Teaching and Learning Programming
  • Social Sciences › Human Factors and Ergonomics › Digital Accessibility for Disabilities
  • Health Sciences › Health Professions › Occupational Therapy › Assistive Technology in Communication and Mobility
Keywords
block-based programming, accessibility, students with disabilities, screen readers, Braille, motor impairment, hardware-accelerated rendering, low vision users, computer science education, programming language design

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