Accessible Math Videos | Scribe

Accessible Math Videos

  • KalturaKaltura
  • ZoomZoom
  • W3W3
  • AdaAda
  • VcuVcu

Overview

Creating accessible math videos involves careful planning, clear narration, and accurate captions. This section begins with general video accessibility tips to help you prepare and record effectively. It then explains how to narrate all visual content and provide accurate captions—the two elements required for legal accessibility compliance. Finally, it outlines how to use Kaltura to review and edit your captions. 

General Video Accessibility Tips

Before Recording

Consider using a script. This isn’t required, but it can help you plan what to say, and manage timing. A script can also make your presentation easier to follow and help you how to narrate your equations.

Minimize background noise. Ambient sounds can make speech difficult to understand, especially for students with hearing loss. Choose a quiet space or consider using a dedicated recording studio if available.

If you write on-screen using a tablet, stylus, or Lightboard, check that your marker colors have good contrast and show up clearly.

During Recording

  • Speak clearly and at a steady pace. Face the camera when possible so students who read lips can follow along.

  • Write clearly on the board, making sure your handwriting is large and legible.

  • Use verbal signposts to help students follow your presentation. For example: “That concludes the section on derivatives—next, we’ll look at integrals.”

  • Explain or define technical terms, idioms, and acronyms as you use them. This supports students with cognitive disabilities, as well as those for whom English is not their first language.

Narrate Visual Content 

In accessibility standards, this practice is called providing an audio description—verbally conveying what’s shown on screen so that students who cannot see the visuals still receive the same information. In instructional videos, this simply means describing aloud any math content, symbols, or visuals essential to understanding the material.

Unlike documents, slides, and PDFs, in video it's acceptable to handwrite equations using a tablet and stylus or Lightboard—as long as you narrate them completely and accurately using correct math terminology (e.g., "x squared plus y squared equals r squared"). This ensures that blind or visually impaired students can follow what's happening in real time.

Also, describe any visual annotations that carry instructional meaning. For instance, If you underline, circle, or highlight something to indicate importance or show relationships, say so aloud: "I'm underlining the final term in red to emphasize it's the variable we'll solve for." However, if a visual marking doesn't add instructional value, it's better to omit it—unnecessary color or decoration can create cognitive clutter and accessibility barriers.

When drawing graphs or diagrams, describe what you're creating as you work. For example: "I'm writing y equals 2x plus 3—this is a straight line with a slope of two and a y-intercept of three." Use high-contrast, legible writing and maintain a consistent layout. Never rely solely on color to convey meaning; always describe it verbally.

Important note: If you're uploading presentation slides to accompany your lecture, you cannot screen shot the equations and insert them in your slides—these equations would not be accessible. The PowerPoint Best Practices section explains how to make slides accessible. 

Provide Accurate Captions

Automated captions alone are not sufficient for legal accessibility compliance under the ADA, Section 504/508, and WCAG 2.2. While tools such as Kaltura, YouTube, or Zoom can generate machine captions, these must always be reviewed and corrected by a human to ensure accuracy and completeness.

Captions must be accurate, complete, synchronized, and easy to read. They must fully reflect all of the video’s spoken content—you cannot condense, summarize, or edit the spoken text in the captions. Captions should appear and disappear in time with the audio, staying on screen long enough to be comfortably read. It’s best practice to display no more than two lines of text on the screen at a time. Sentences should start with a capital letter and end with a period, with other punctuation used only as needed for clarity. Bold, italics, and underlining should not be used in captions. 

Caption files use plain text and cannot display superscripts, subscripts, or special mathematical symbols. This is why narrating equations fully is essential—the captions will reflect your spoken words, not the visual formatting.

When captioning:

  • Use standard keyboard symbols (=, +, -, etc.) when possible. If the instructor says "x equals 5," the caption should read "x = 5"

  • Spell out what cannot be typed with standard symbols. If you write x² + y² = 10 and say "x squared plus y squared equals ten," the caption should read "x squared plus y squared equals 10"

General Video Accessibility Tips

Before Recording

  • Consider using a script. This isn’t required, but it can help you plan what to say, and manage timing. A script can also make your presentation easier to follow and help you how to narrate your equations.

  • Minimize background noise. Ambient sounds can make speech difficult to understand, especially for students with hearing loss. Choose a quiet space or consider using a dedicated recording studio if available.

  • If you use a Lightboard or write on screen, check that your marker colors have good contrast and show up clearly.

During Recording

  • Speak clearly and at a steady pace. Face the camera when possible so students who read lips can follow along.

  • Write clearly on the board, making sure your handwriting is large and legible.

  • Use verbal signposts to help students follow your presentation. For example: “That concludes the section on derivatives—next, we’ll look at integrals.”

  • Explain or define technical terms, idioms, and acronyms as you use them. This supports students with cognitive disabilities, as well as those for whom English is not their first language.

Using Kaltura

VCU uses Kalutra for video captioning. To create automated captions or edit existing captions  in Kaltura:

  1. Open VCU’s Kaltura

  2. Select Login then “My Media”

  3. Login using your VCU ID and password

  4. Select the appropriate video

  5. Select “Actions” then “Edit”

  6. Click the Captions tab.

  7. Click the pencil icon to create automated captions or edit the existing captions.

  8. Click Save to apply your changes.

Recommended Resources