Amplify Access to Creative Learning: Designing Accessible Fine Arts Experiences
A workshop to open inclusive pathways to the arts
How do you make a work of art, performance, studio demonstration, or creative assignment accessible when seeing, hearing, movement, or physical interaction may be central to the experience?
Fine arts courses present distinctive accessibility challenges because students often learn through visual, auditory, spatial, embodied, and hands-on experiences. Providing access does not mean removing those experiences, or lowering expectations for creative or disciplinary work. It means considering what students need to perceive, interpret, experience, and create, and designing meaningful ways for them to engage with those goals.
In this hands-on workshop, faculty will explore practical approaches to accessibility in visual and performing arts courses. Using principles informed by Universal Design for Learning (UDL) and accessible course design, participants will examine examples such as artwork and images, performances, audio and video, studio demonstrations, critiques, and creative assignments. Together, we'll consider how descriptions, captions, transcripts, demonstrations, multiple forms of representation, and thoughtfully designed alternatives can expand access while preserving the essential learning experience.
Session Objectives
By the end of this session, participants will be able to:
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Identify potential accessibility barriers in visual, auditory, spatial, embodied, and studio-based learning experiences.
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Distinguish the essential disciplinary experience from the particular format through which students currently encounter it.
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Evaluate how descriptions, captions, transcripts, demonstrations, and multiple representations can support access to artistic content and experiences.
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Apply accessibility and UDL-informed principles while maintaining creative choice, disciplinary expectations, and authentic engagement.
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Redesign one element of a fine arts course to provide another meaningful pathway to the intended learning goal.
Participants are encouraged to apply these ideas to an activity or learning material from one of their own courses and identify a realistic change they can make to reduce barriers without compromising creative or disciplinary goals.
Who should attend? Faculty teaching visual arts, music, theatre, dance, film, or related creative disciplines who want practical strategies for making artistic and creative learning experiences more accessible.
Come prepared to work on your course. Bring one image, performance clip, studio demonstration, critique activity, creative assignment, or other learning experience from a course you currently teach or plan to teach. You'll have an opportunity to identify potential barriers and begin redesigning it during the session. No prior accessibility experience is required.
This session will be facilitated by Dr. Susan Biro, Manager, Online Learning and Dr. Peter Ariev, Instructional Design Specialist.
This collaborative workshop is part of CoRE Learning Design, an extension of the Course Roadmap to Equity initiative. Insights from the session will help shape future discipline-specific examples, resources, and support.