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Processes to Make Charts More Accessible for Students

Introduction:
Like images, most charts are not accessible to screen readers; however, charts built
within PowerPoint have corresponding data tables that are accessible and can be added to the
slide. Making charts more accessible in PowerPoint depends on a few different factors. The main
factor as mentioned is if the chart has a built-in data table or not. We will look at a few different
ways of making charts accessible based on what our starting point is and using different tools
(Word, PPT, PDF, and Excel).

Converting PowerPoint chart (with no dataset):

We will first look at what to do if you have a PowerPoint slide that includes a chart that does not
include a dataset connected to Excel. A data set is the collection of connected data (typically
represented by numbers) that can be utilized to create tables, charts, etc. When you input data
into an Excel Spreadsheet, the collection of those numbers is referred to as a “data set.” In this
case, usually a PowerPoint is pulled from a website or is shared without the embed workbook.
An embed workbook is when a chart or table within a program such as PowerPoint or Word is
linked to an Excel spreadsheet that contains the data set for that chart or table. When you create a
new Chart and manually insert data into a linked Excel Spreadsheet, that information is linked to
a chart or visual table you create thus why it is an embed workbook. As for creating a data table
in PowerPoint from a chart without a embed data set, we will look at 2 process that include steps
and information to follow below:

Process 1:
The steps below involve a few more steps than additional processes provided in this document,
however, may take less time as there the steps provide a way to bypass manually entering
information into Excel.

A. Steps to convert Chart that is already in PowerPoint (does not have an excel data set
attached) to a data table using PPT, PDF, and Word:
1. Copy the chart to a new file
2. Format the chart with a data table
a. Make sure to remove the legend and vertical axis so that there is no extra
text where the data table will be
b. Add a data table by clicking to the chart object so the data is shown below
the chart.
i. Do this by clicking “Add Chart Element”
ii. Then Click “Data Table”
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iii. Select the option to not have legend keys in the data table

c. So far your chart should look like this with a data table at the bottom:

3. Create a PNG image of table

a. Copy the chart only. On a new blank slide, use the Paste Special option to
paste it as a PNG image. Don’t select any other type of image, use the
PNG image type. Crop the image so just the table of numbers is shown on
the slide.
b. The cropped image should now look similar to this:

Important to note: This may appear like a data set, however, this data table alone is not
readable by a screen reader, therefore additional steps are needed to make this
information accessible. Continue to follow the steps below:

4. Create a PDF file:

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a. The PDF file must only have one slide and that slide must have the PNG
table image from Step 3. You may delete all the other slides from the file
you are working in or copy the one slide with the PNG table to a new
PowerPoint file.
b. To save the data set as a PDF, click “File” located in the top left corner of
PowerPoint, then click “Save as Adobe PDF”. You will need to make sure
the PowerPoint is saved first before saving the document as a PDF as well.
5. Open the PDF file and convert it in Word:
a. Start Word and create a new blank document. Open the PDF file you
saved in Step 4 and let Word convert it to a Word Document. It should
create a Word table. You can check by clicking in the table and checking
that the Table Design and Layout ribbons appear.
b. Once Word has converted the PDF document to a word document, you
should be able to click inside the information within the data table. This is
what it should look like in Word once converted over:

6. Copy the cell contents by selecting all the content in the cells in the Word table.
Paste the contents into the next PowerPoint slide from your original PowerPoint.
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You may paste the contents either with the original source formatting (from word)
or with a Destination Style. These paste options should appear to you when you
right click on the separate slide on the PowerPoint document. When you paste the
information you should have a Table that looks something like this:
Note: Please make sure to add any headers necessary. You may also wish to change the font
color, size, style and the contrast to be more accessible for students. See accessibility/ Universal

Design Principles on page 6.

Moving forward: If you would like to take the cell contents from the Word Document
and transfer them into an Excel worksheet (to have on hand) use the following steps to do
so. Having an Excel data set of the information may be helpful if you need to make any
changes or updates to the data later on.
7. Press Ctrl+C to copy the selection. Go to the Excel worksheet you want the data
to be in. Select to Paste the text using the Match Destination Formatting option so
that the text is pasted in without the formatting from Word.
8. Check the cells to verify that the content was copied in correctly. Sometimes there
will be a cell where there is no data or a heading is missing. Add those in based
on the table image in step 3. Occasionally numbers formatted with a comma or
decimal place may have a space added after the comma or period. This causes
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Excel to interpret them as text, not as numbers. These cells will have the number
left aligned like text instead of right aligned like a number. Edit the cells to
remove the extra space and Excel will now interpret the values as numbers. If you
want, you can use the NUMBERVALUE function in Excel to convert all of the
cells (whether they are numbers or text) to plain numbers. Save your Excel file
with the data from the chart.

Additional Tools for Process 1:

● Link to website with above process including pictures and additional information:
https://www.thinkoutsidetheslide.com/extract-data-from-a-linked-excel-chart-in-
powerpoint-issue-476-october-27-2020/
● Video Tutorial of above Process: https://www.youtube.com/watch?
v=FTOor0XXD8w&t=30s

Process 2:
This process of Converting a Chart in PowerPoint to a Data Table involves less steps than the
above process but may take more time as one step below is to manually enter the data from the
chart in PowerPoint into an Excel Spreadsheet.
Converting Chart that is already a PowerPoint (does not have an excel data set attached)
using only PPT and Excel:
1. Copy the chart to a new file.
2. Format the chart with a data table. (Similar to step 2 in process 1 above)
a. Make sure to remove the legend and vertical axis so that there is no extra
text where the data table will be.
b. Add a data table by clicking to the chart object so the data is shown below
the chart.
i. Do this by clicking “Add Chart Element”
ii. Then Click “Data Table”
iii. Select the option to not have legend keys in the data table
c. Open Excel and manually enter data information into excel spreadsheet.
d. Using data set from Excel and copy and paste data table into PPT.
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Creating Accessible Tables from Charts (that is connected Excel data set)
How to create accessible charts from the start in PowerPoint (from scratch where the creation of
a data set in excel makes the process easier):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=75H_UKrR9TE
Step 1: Right click on the chart you would like to convert to a data set table
Step 2: Click “Edit Table” from the drop down menu and then select “Edit Data Set in Excel”.
When you do this an Excel Data Sheet will pop up. An example is shown below:
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Step 3: In Excel, select the data you wish to make a data table, then copy and paste this table
onto the very next slide on your PowerPoint from the original chart. Make sure to add alt-text to
the chart on the slide prior that states “more accessible data table on next slide” so that it
indicates to an individual using a screen reader to utilize the table on the next page. An example
of the data table after it has been copied and pasted is shown below:

Step 4: Where possible, adjust the font, contrast, and size of the Data Table to be more
accessible. Use the accessibility/ Universal Design Principles below to help:

Accessibility / Universal Design

Criteria Annotation

☐ 1 – Images and graphs are described 1 - Moodle offers the ability to create alt-tags for
via an alt-tag. images that can simply be typed in. This allows users
with screen readers to understand what the image
☐ 2 – Images contained within conveys.
documents and PPTs include alt-tags.
2 – Documents that contain images that do not have
☐ 3 – PDFs that contain text are not alt-tags will not be accessible for those using screen
merely image scans. readers, so alt-tags must be added.

☐ 4 – Tables are set up as text and not 3 – PDFs that are merely scanned images are not
embedded as images readable by screen readers and must be updated to be
text that can be understood by assistive technology.
☐ 5 – Font and colors are used
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consistently. 4 – Tables that are screenshots/images are not

readable by screen readers and should be set up as text
within Moodle or a document instead.

5 - Text colors alone are not relied on to convey

meaning. Underlined text is avoided unless used for
navigation. To cut down on visual overwhelm, please
use no more than three colors of text per page.
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Additional Helpful Accessibility Resources

Helpful Accessibility Training Course:
LinkedIn Learning Accessibility Training
Linkedin Learning Support for accessibility in PowerPoint:
LinkedIn Learning Making PPT's more accessible
Youtube link for PowerPoint accessibility:
How to make PPT's more accessible
● At 11:30 in the video, they discuss making Figures, Charts, SmartArt in PPT more
accessible.