Designing, Development, Implementation and Assessment of the Accessible Mass Open Learning Platforms for the Visually Impaired Individuals

ABSTRACT
The aim of this study is to design, develop, implement and evaluate an accessible mass open learning platform for visually impaired individuals. The study group consists of experts in the field who want to contribute to the study voluntarily with the snowball sampling method and have not used the platform before, with or without visual impairment. Thirty-eight visually impaired individuals and ten field experts participated in all stages of the study, a total of forty-eight volunteer users. At the analysis stage, it was tried to reach the features that an open and freely accessible learning platform should have. In this process, interviews were held with visually impaired individuals and subject matter experts. During the implementation phase, usability testing was conducted for the learning platform with visually impaired individuals. Within the scope of the usability test, the effectiveness and efficiency of the learning platform and the satisfaction levels of the participants were revealed. Visually impaired individuals were observed through the observation form for effectiveness and efficiency. In addition, semi-structured interviews were conducted with visually impaired individuals and subject area experts for satisfaction after the completion of the tasks. Content and document analysis was carried out according to the characteristics of the data obtained during the research. In the evaluation phase, the open and freely accessible learning platform developed lastly was evaluated by the automatic test tool. The design principles of the study for an accessible mass open learning platform for visually impaired individuals were revealed.