In short:

  1. Make shorter sessions with multiple types of activities (presentations, round table, doing, etc.)

  2. Offer multiple media for the learning material (video, audio, slides, text)

  1. Share tools that support with Dyslexia (OpenDyslexic Chrome Extension, Notebook LM , Speechify)

I've never thought about making my courses better for people who have Dyslexia or ADHD, until a Service Design learner gave me feedback on how to adapt my course content to help people who have them. Based on her feedback here is how I've adapted the training and so far it seems to work well:

Make shorter sessions with multiple types of activities.

That's something that I was already doing, but that the student told me worked really well for her. Usually in my Service Design classes where I use the "Learning by teaching" approach, the activities are rather short and very different:

  • Going through learning material: 1h

  • Learning loops (3 in one day)

    • Learner presentation (15 minutes)

    • Round table where everyone shares their own experience (10 minutes)

    • Doing activity (20 minutes)

    • Round table where everyone shares what they learned by doing (10 minutes)

Offer multiple media for the learning material

Reading long texts can be challenging for people with Dyslexia or ADHD, so now in my training material I try to always have a mix of different material:

  • Video or audio

  • Slides

  • Text

Share tools that support with Dyslexia

There are many apps that help people with Dyslexia, here a few that I have recommended in the past and that are pretty nice.

  • OpenDyslexic Chrome Extension (free): An extension that changes the font of every text in your browser to a font that is optimized for people with Dyslexia.

  • Google Notebook LM (free): An app that turns any text material in a podcast that you can listen to.

  • Speechify (paid): An app that turns any written text into an audio version. I use this myself when I have to read long academic texts in German which makes it much easier for me to stay focused as I'll both see the text and hear it.