Scratch Accessibility for Low-vision and Blind Users

Herb506

say [I have written in a block!:D]
when green flag clicked

Herb506

That was right wrong!

Herb506

Herb506

legofire7

Dear Scratch Team,

I am suggesting you add morse code and binary code to the translate block. It would help me a lot if you could do that.

traslate morse code
translate binary code

One of your Scratchers,

Legofire7

Jedibrine

I think that using text-speech will be too complicated for low-vision or blind users. I think that the best option for low-vision users would be to add multiple light settings, so there could be a menu to configure which colors match to something else. Basically, the user can choose what color will red be represented as on the site. This would allow users with different types of color blindness to tailor the colors to settings they can see well. For example:

USER PREFERENCES
Intensity: 50%
Contrast: 50%
Saturation: 50%
Brightness: 50%

COLOR CONFIGURATION
Red:
Orange:
Yellow:
etc

There could also be some pre-saved color templates with a different color palette based on the types of color blindness there are. For users that are blind, you could maybe create real life Scratch blocks that would let the user code by moving blocks in real life. It would be a sort of interactive Scratch, and I know that Scratch is non-profit, but maybe there could be some experimentation done with this concept. Possible, even an extension could be made for something like this.

The color selection and preferences would be beneficial for people that code on devices like a chromebook (where it is complicated to change color settings) and people that have different degrees photosensitivity. I am suggesting these concepts based on my experience with having a sort of color dullness and high photosensitivity.

DANCEYOURWAY4444

when green flag clicked
say [Yeet!!!!] for (2) secs

Herb506

Hello there

Herb506

when green flag clicked
say [lol] for (2) secs
wait (2) secs
say [Floss] for (2) secs
broadcast [Fun with blocks! ]

Troyer_Kem

Herb506 wrote:

when green flag clicked
say [lol] for (2) secs
wait (2) secs
say [Floss] for (2) secs
broadcast [Fun with blocks! ]

Don't spamblock please. And don't post irrelevant things.

hotchill wrote:
a voice to help people who are blind make it easier to bild a project.

i can see perfectly but put this in to discussion.

thanks

vito
scratch name hotchill

0 posts?! Interesting…

legofire7 wrote:
Dear Scratch Team,

I am suggesting you add morse code and binary code to the translate block. It would help me a lot if you could do that.
traslate morse code
translate binary code
 
One of your Scratchers,

Legofire7

Please suggest this in a new topic in Suggestions forum.

ScratchCatGoesMeow

Add voice recognition blocks so people can make projects usable to blind users. Make a text size control, as ctlr+ does not enlarge text

life_is_precious

hii

Last edited by life_is_precious (July 7, 2019 14:32:49)

life_is_precious

[

Last edited by life_is_precious (July 7, 2019 14:31:30)

life_is_precious

you know on you scratch offline editor make sure you ad more tools and if it is possible make it like the scratch online like you can chat on scratch do that on the offline one you can share project do that on the offline editor and u get me now thx

when green flag clicked
say [thx so much please reply and let me know if it is possible]

whiteandblackcat

kenny2scratch wrote:
Oh, wow! Well, do I have a story to share!

I'm color blind - I am a “strong deutan”, meaning that it's difficult for me to tell the difference between reds/greens and blues/purples. Additionally, certain shades of red or orange look orange or yellow. Besides that, in general, dark color shades are impossible.
How does this affect my usage of Scratch? To put it simply: category colors. In 2.0, the Motion and Looks categories are practically identical - I lose combined hours of productivity because I went to the Looks palette to find “change x by ()”. Also, the difference between Pen and Operators is miniscule, though their distance from each other helps differentiate them.
In Scratch 3.0, it's even worse - Motion and Looks are completely identical and Control, Events, and Data have very little difference in color, if at all.
Some areas of the website aren't great either - the grays sometimes look blue, or vice versa.

I hope you can work your way towards solving this! It would certainly save me (and other colorblind users!) much time
I also respect your mission - blindess (of any kind) is overlooked a lot.

I wish you well on your project!

aaah that would be annoying…
would it maybe help if there was a way to permanently customise each colour section, so people could have a bit of fun changing their colour categories, and colour blind people could customise the categories to be colours they could tell the difference between?

whiteandblackcat

thecreatorjacob wrote:
hi scratch team i was wondering if you can make all blocks fit into all places. for example: if play sound pop then change volume by 10. i hope this information helps!

but how would scratch follow that logic? it would just return errors, potentially confusing beginners. with the current system, you can easily see what you can put in certain places.

whiteandblackcat

jokebookservice1 wrote:
In the forums, let us provide alternative text to allow screen-readers to read about the image.
Additionally, display this text so that the entire community can help moderate the text and ensure it's relevant and descriptive.

yes alternative text is something that should be added. maybe in a box down the bottom? The creator could put the alt text or if there wasn't any maybe members of the community could add it but have to be approved by the project's creator. it could help people with colour blindness (e.g. not having to read coloured text on a coloured background) and would probably be easier to use with text to speech. the alt text would show when the mouse was hovering over the text/image and clicking the box / pressing something would act as if you had just clicked that button.

superk100

when green flag clicked
forever
if <touching [Scratch Cat v] ?> then
create clone of [ myself]
end
end

superk100

when [ space] key pressed

stamp
create clone of [ myself[scratchblocks]
][/scratchblocks]
say []Welcome to Scratch! for (2) secs

OC-parrot

shelbystar_909 wrote:
I think you could have a speaking block that when you put it on it could just say what ever you typed in it that way they can still hear and for color blind people you could make projects black and white since thats what they see

It matters what type of colour blindness. If you are completely colourblind, which is relatively rare, then that would make more sense. If you are a red-green colourblind person or a blue-yellow colour blind person, however, you can see most of the spectrum, just not some colours. Therefore, it would make sense to just change the colouration of the problematic blocks a bit so they are distinguishable.

Discuss Scratch