“That Dog is Green?!” – How We Can Support Colour-Blind Students

Read time – 5 minutes 

I’m colour blind. I found out when I was around 8. In school, we had a task where we had to count different colour dots and write down the amount of each colour. I was good at Maths – often the first to finish – I mean, I went on to become a Maths teacher! This task though, this task was impossible! Every single time I went up to check my answers, I was told I was wrong. I couldn’t do it. We got to the end of the lesson, and I still couldn’t. Why? Because I was colour blind. 

Since, I don’t think colour blindness has impacted me. I have done very well academically and professionally. The most colour blindness has impacted me is when people ask if I see in black and white, and/or proceed to show me a number of different objects, to which they want me to tell them what colour I see. 

I did though, recently have my first big colour-blind moment. I saw a green dog. And when I say green, I mean a beautifully rich, velvet green. It was stunning. Apart from it wasn’t green. It was brown. But then that probably doesn’t surprise you! (What did surprise me is that the green coat I wore all winter and loved, is in fact, brown). 

I got lucky – I did well academically and see green dogs (legally). But some students aren’t this lucky. For some students, the work that we expect them to do in schools just isn’t possible. Think my counting-coloured dots issue, but many times worse, and repeated often.  

> How do you successfully analyse a choropleth map? 

> How do you do flame tests in chemistry? 

> How do you do interpret bar charts? 

What can we do to help these students in our schools? I’m borrowing here, mainly, from the WJEC and Colour Blind Awareness Society document, How to design accessible and inclusive assessment materials for colour blind learners. It is a brilliant document, which you should read if you want further details.  

Here are some key considerations (in no particular order) that I have pulled from the document, to share with you: 

1. Only use distinguishing colours where integral to content understanding.  

1. Avoid using a range of font colours, again where not integral (for example, often seeing red words within black text is very difficult, myself included). 

1. There is no one colour palette that works for all (unfortunately). 

1. Avoid conveying information by colour alone. 

1. Utilise black and white texture, such as dots, lines and hatching as alternatives. 

1. Do not rely on one student or member of staff, who are colour-blind, to advise, as they only will have one type of colour-blindness.  

1. If colour is being used, incorporate it with line design (e.g. dots, hatch) so there are multiple ways to decode the information.  

1. Strongly mark boundaries between different colours (for example in choropleth maps) and explode segments where possible (for example in a pie chart). 

1. Print pictures in greyscale if possible.  

1. Avoid low contrast between two colours which overlay or sit next to each other. 

There you are – 10 top things to consider when you are supporting your colour blind students!