Guide
Reading order: PowerPoint presentations
Have you checked the reading order of your PPT slides? Learn why reading order is important to students who use screen readers or keyboard navigation!
Just like a story sequence has an order – the beginning, middle and end – educational materials should also be read in a logical order. When you visually read through a document, web page or slide presentation, you follow a logical order that matches the visual content on the page: this logical order is typically left to right and top to bottom. But does your screen reader always read items in the correct order? Well, it depends on how the resource was created!
While reading order does apply to documents, web pages and slides in a slide presentation, in this post, we are specifically looking at the reading order of slides in a PowerPoint presentation
Why is reading order important?
Reading order determines the order in which assistive technology will read the content. Logical reading order refers to the sequential arrangement of content in a document, slide or webs page that allows students to comprehend the information in a coherent and meaningful way. Not everyone navigates using a mouse or trackpad. Students who use a screen reader or who have motor disabilities often rely on keyboard navigation. As the student navigates through the slide, the items on the screen should be announced in the correct order, making it easier for the student to understand and follow the given content. For example, if viewing a slide, the title of the slide is given first, providing a quick snippet stating what that slide is about. Depending on the slide, the text content is often given next and then the alt text description of the image. If the order is wrong and the alt text is announced first, the student may struggle trying to figure out the context or what the goal of the slide is. Hearing the title first provides the context and helps the student to mentally organize the information of the slide and how this slide’s content fits into the whole slide presentation.
Slide presentation
The reading order in a slide presentation is a way of putting the various elements on each slide in the correct order. The preset layouts all have the correct reading order; however, if the author adds additional elements such as textboxes, images, audio or video the reading order may no longer be correct.
When generating your own slide layout or if adding additional elements to the slide, the reading order is determined by the order in which items were placed on each slide. When this occurs, you will need to specifically check the reading order on each slide.
PowerPoint reading order on a PC
With PowerPoints, use the Check Accessibility tool which scans the entire slide deck for accessibility issues. The Check Accessibility will open a report that includes reading order issues. To check the reading order, open the desired PowerPoint presentation.
- Select Review > Check Accessibility
- On a PC: Select the Check Reading Order category under the Warnings section to open the list. When the reading order of the elements on a slide does not match the common ways that the elements are spatially ordered, the Accessibility Checker will list the slide number here.
- Select the desired slide number. This opens the Reading Order for items on that specific slide.
- The elements are listed in the current order and numbered.
- The elements in the list are order as expected, from the top to the bottom.
- Images that are marked as “unchecked” are considered “decorative” and the description of the element will now have the text, “decorative”. The screen reader will not announce decorative items.
- If there is a caution symbol, it identifies images that do not have alt text or that the alt text has been automatically generated and should be approved or edited.
- Select the element with the caution symbol and a textbox appears. Type in the desired alt text for that image or approve the auto generated alt text.
- To change the reading order, select one or more items in the list. (Use Control + Click to select multiple items.)
- Drag the selected items up or down or use the up arrow or down arrow.
Resources
- PowerPoint reading order feature (Microsoft’s information includes screen shots and the more complex skill of grouping elements on a slide.
- Quick tips about using the reading order in PowerPoint (Mac vs. PC) YouTube tutorial (with practical hints!)
- PowerPoint Slide Order – Tech Tip Tuesday YouTube video (Includes JAWS commands)
PowerPoint reading order on a Mac
- Select Review > Check Accessibility
- The Accessibility Pane will show all the type of accessibility issues and how many.
- To see and resolve specific accessibility issues, select the desired slide, then select the Selection pane in the ribbon.
- Note: The elements in the list are ordered from the bottom to the top.
- To change the reading order, select one or more items in the list.
- Drag the selected items up or down or use the up arrow or down arrow.
Hint: The name of each element may be confusing. Example: “Slide Number Placeholder 5”. If you are not sure what element that is, select it and a visual box will appear around that element. If an element from the original slide is visually hidden in the slide, it still appears in the Selection Pane. Select the “see” symbol (visually looks like an eye) to the right of the desired text in the selection pane – this will make that element temporarily disappear from the slide (visually) and a “hide” symbol (visually looks like a dash) will replace the “see” symbol. The screen reader will ignore elements that are hidden. Select the hide symbol and the element will visually reappear and the symbol will change back to the “see” symbol.
Resource
Published August 2024.
By Diane Brauner
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