I think we should do our best to make the web accessible to various types of disabled persons but to expect that one can design a website so that everyone will get the same experience is utterly unrealistic. Need I mention browser differences?

As for your thoughts on how to add extra help, I think that if your site is aimed at students who have learning disabilities, then they are your primary audience, and you can do what you need to reach that group to the detriment of other groups’ experiences. But, if your site is for a general audience, you should make reasonable adjustments so that the site is viewable/accessible to a more general group.

You are right, our goal is to make the sites accessible for as many viewer groups as possible. A goal of making the playing field level is about all we can truly strive to accomplish. The statement in your response about people’s understanding of our presented content being out of our hands is right on. I have had that thought often dealing with students who struggle to gain meaning no matter what I present nor how it is presented. I do not think you are callous, only realistic. It is impossible to fully program for every sub-group. The tactics presented in the readings can help when expertise is built, but there swould still be some viewers who struggle with content.

I thought that to address some of the needs of readers who need comprehension help we could program mouse-over pop-up windows of vocabulary/concept explanations. However, that would be distracting to readers who have no need of the extra help. Then you reach the debate of how much should non-challenged people be inconvenienced in order to meet the needs of a population in need of help. A debate that always rages in education.

You mentioned:
“I didn’t think that it was that they couldn’t read at all. Dyslexia, I always understood, is a disability that one can learn to overcome or compensate for. I know there are others. Some people learn better by hearing than by reading, so couldn’t they get a screen reader? Until I understand more about how this group of people uses the Web, I cannot accommodate them.”

I thought of using a screen reader for my students who read at a substantially below grade level, but then I heard the reader simulation. It works at such a rate that many young people with reading difficulties could not keep up. Often the problem is in the processing in their brain, it just works in a different way, and at a slower rate. Many of these children can get meaning out of a text if you give them extended time to employ various comprehension strategies. I guess my point is that there is no easy solution. Do not feel bad about not yet knowing how to program for them, there is no easy way to get inside their processing to help.