Including captioning for excursions

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Wednesday, 19 August 2015 12:11pm

The principles of CAP THAT! don’t have to stop at the school gate. There are options for including captioning as part of an excursion; it just requires a little research and planning beforehand.

Teacher and six primary school students standing outside a building

Incorporate captions into excursion planning

  • Research the venue beforehand to see if it offers captioned excursions, guides or videos as part of the education package. Make sure you contact them directly and remember that sometimes the captions may be English subtitles that are provided as part of multiple-language options.
  • Don’t overlook video previews and background information that can be found on websites that may be captioned. For example, the Federal Parliament provides captions on its education videos about the functioning of Parliament and teaching ideas.
  • If you are organising an excursion to see a captioned movie, there is likely to be a captioned trailer of the movie that you can watch beforehand.
  • You can also do some basic research and look on YouTube or other internet video sites for captioned videos about the topic.
  • See whether it is possible to use a remote captioning service as part of the excursion.  Captions can be delivered to a tablet or smartphone wherever there is an internet connection.

Types of captioned excursions

  • Many performing arts companies offer captioned performances, some of which are outlined in Media Access Australia’s captions in the arts pages. It always pays to call ahead of time and check whether they offer the service and when it is scheduled.
  • Some museums and galleries offer captioned tours via Conexu Foundation’s OpenAccess Tours.
  • A similar service is now operating for other types of venues, such as Melbourne’s Werribee Zoo through OpenAccess Excursions.
  • Museums and other attractions often incorporate captioned multimedia as part of their displays. You should ask when booking the excursions through the schools program.
  • Most cinemas offer captioned sessions. If you are planning a visit to a cinema that uses the CaptiView system, you should call and ensure that they have enough CaptiView units for the number of students who will use the captions. If you have a large group, you may be able to negotiate an open-captioned screening where the whole audience sees the captions. You can also contact Open Caption Australia about open captioned screenings in your area.
  • Some attractions offer a video conferencing facility for remote excursions, such as Dubbo’s Western Plains Zoo. You could arrange your regular caption provider to incorporate captions as part of this experience. 

Encourage the service

It is a good idea to acknowledge that a venue is providing captioned resources and let them know that you are using them. Similarly, for venues that don’t offer captioning, let them know that you need captions and this is a factor in whether you book an excursion with them or not.

Including captions as part of a school excursion is an important part of helping inclusive education.


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