Redesign for EdTechLive
An upgraded interface to amplify student voice to create engaging and effective education.
DURATION Team. MY ROLE
3 months Jiayi Tang Research
Mina Barakatain Ideation
Tim Lu UX Design
Meghana Narayanan User Testing
Martha Brandt
Jade Zhang
Amber Lee
Background
About EdTechLive: Our client EdTechLive is a New York-based education technology company that focuses on using research-based Student Educational Engagement Diagnostic Surveys (SEEDS) to empower a more engaging learning experience that will benefit both students and educators.
With their current platform, educators routinely administer the student surveys after each class, following which professional learning tips are assigned by dedicated Tip Masters. These tips provide guidance on how to teach and structure lessons, with links to additional resources, in a manner that improves student engagement. However, educators indicated that receiving tips before lessons rather than after would be more valuable to their lesson planning process.
Our Mission:
The objectives for the project firstly include gaining a thorough understanding of the industry landscape and user personas (educator and administrator), through primary user interviews and secondary research, competitor, and literature analysis. Based on this, we hope to reinvent the process of educators requesting, receiving, and managing tips such that the inputs revolve around the curriculum plan rather than survey results. Based on the new user journey flow, we will then redesign the existing product user interface and user experience to enable educators to receive actionable tips before lessons on a platform that is functionally comprehensive and visually pleasing to our focus user groups.
Response
The solution we designed for our client is an upgraded version of the existing educator dashboards. The features to be included were rooted in decisions based on initial research and user interview findings. We conducted 8 user interviews in total, a combination of both educators and school administrators. We found that the top priorities for educators included the overall curriculum structure, lesson planning, classroom environment, seeking advice from external and internal sources within their school, and finally, gathering and implementing feedback from students.
Process Overview
Research
Competitive Analysis
We found that Edtech competitors that use survey results, used student feedback for purposes more than just to improve teaching – commonly seen themes include school safety, environmental constraints, administrative support, and COVID-related health support. Those that did not use surveys adopted more interactive approaches to gathering feedback that improves teaching and learning outcomes like focus groups or one-on-one meetings, class reflections, etc.
Literature Review
How to make an engaging lesson?
Our insight is to make the course content relevant to students, which can make the course more effective. Also, customized curriculum according to the needs of students.
For example, you can design the content and structure of the course with students before the course starts, which will allow students to have more participation in the course.
How to capture students' voices?
We found that there are many ways to capture students' voices, including student surveys, interviews, classroom observations, and so on. One of the methods to increase the value of student surveys is to gather feedback not only from students but also from the broader school community, such as teachers and parents.
For the survey content, There is also a need to ensure that the questions reflect the breadth of concepts the school is interested in, and that the questions are tailored to different needs at different stages.
Online Teacher Forums
We looked at popular online teacher forums such as A to Z Teacher Stuff. We found that most questions were related to a pain point. The new teachers felt stressed due to the amount of negative anonymous feedback given by students in a particular class. Reaching out to other teachers can help them to better understand how to approach this type of feedback.
User Research
Interviews
We conducted 8 interviews with educators and administrators ranging from 45 minutes to one hour. From them, we want to learn educators' curriculum structure, lesson planning, factors like experience level and environment, how they gather advice from external and internal sources, and how they gather feedback from students.
Affinity Diagram
Persona
Journey Map
Design
Mid-F Prototype
Design Rationale
Modular Design of Dashboard
Educators indicated that they teach multiple class types or periods throughout the day. Hence, we allowed the option for them to add more than one class to the dashboard through a tabular system at the top. The different components of the dashboard are structured into individual modules so as to reduce coupling between features and therefore increase organization and clarity. Also, it can help to easily amend individual features as needed.
Educators indicated that they teach multiple class types or periods throughout the day. Hence, we allowed the option for them to add more than one class to the dashboard through a tabular system at the top. The different components of the dashboard are structured into individual modules so as to reduce coupling between features and therefore increase organization and clarity. Also, it can help to easily amend individual features as needed.
Calendar & Requesting Tips
We decided on a calendar because interviews showed that teachers don’t directly use the state learning standards to teach but turn those into unit plans and lesson plans which can last anywhere from a few weeks to months. We allow educators to add classes and lessons through the use of pop-ups - these allow educators to indicate the length of time they want to spend on each as well as link them to the teacher goals and state learning targets.
We decided on a calendar because interviews showed that teachers don’t directly use the state learning standards to teach but turn those into unit plans and lesson plans which can last anywhere from a few weeks to months. We allow educators to add classes and lessons through the use of pop-ups - these allow educators to indicate the length of time they want to spend on each as well as link them to the teacher goals and state learning targets.
The request a tip functionality is embedded into the calendar view, allowing the educators to link tips to specific units and lessons
It helps visualize when an educator has requested a tip and whether or not it has been fulfilled.
Engagement Survey
Educators indicated that they collect feedback from their students but it usually just sits as data and they aren’t able to properly visualize and observe the progress over time. We extended the calendar view so the engagement results are viewed as a timeline and they can be viewed inline with corresponding units taught and tips received. We only display the overall engagement score rather than the whole report so that users are not overwhelmed by the amount of information. Instead, they can focus their attention on the change over time which is highlighted through the use of different colors.
Educators indicated that they collect feedback from their students but it usually just sits as data and they aren’t able to properly visualize and observe the progress over time. We extended the calendar view so the engagement results are viewed as a timeline and they can be viewed inline with corresponding units taught and tips received. We only display the overall engagement score rather than the whole report so that users are not overwhelmed by the amount of information. Instead, they can focus their attention on the change over time which is highlighted through the use of different colors.
Teacher Goals
In our dashboard, we included a module that addresses educator goals as interviews indicated that administrators encourage educators to make their yearly and classroom goals prominent in their everyday teaching. In this module, we allow teachers to indicate their goals for specific classes or generally for the whole year. Educators and administrators indicated that these goals are usually set early in the planning process for the year - for this reason, we let the focus of the dashboard be on the calendar views while making the goals still visible as they can be actively integrated into the planning of units and/or lessons. We sectioned the goals into categories such as class environment and instructional strategies to allow the educators to better organize their goals.
In our dashboard, we included a module that addresses educator goals as interviews indicated that administrators encourage educators to make their yearly and classroom goals prominent in their everyday teaching. In this module, we allow teachers to indicate their goals for specific classes or generally for the whole year. Educators and administrators indicated that these goals are usually set early in the planning process for the year - for this reason, we let the focus of the dashboard be on the calendar views while making the goals still visible as they can be actively integrated into the planning of units and/or lessons. We sectioned the goals into categories such as class environment and instructional strategies to allow the educators to better organize their goals.
Student Inventory
And finally, we want to encourage educators to include student voice and input into their lesson planning. This is especially important to our client, EdTechLive. Our interviews suggested that educators currently primarily do this intuitively just by observation and instinct. Instead, we want to formalize the process by issuing surveys at regular intervals, breaking down the results, and presenting them to the educators directly on the dashboard.
For instance, in this prototype, we have displayed a pie chart of the preferred learning styles of students, which can be directly linked to the teacher goals. Also, these results are indicated next to our student engagement feedback graph on the dashboard. This allows educators to view these two form results side-by-side.
And finally, we want to encourage educators to include student voice and input into their lesson planning. This is especially important to our client, EdTechLive. Our interviews suggested that educators currently primarily do this intuitively just by observation and instinct. Instead, we want to formalize the process by issuing surveys at regular intervals, breaking down the results, and presenting them to the educators directly on the dashboard.
For instance, in this prototype, we have displayed a pie chart of the preferred learning styles of students, which can be directly linked to the teacher goals. Also, these results are indicated next to our student engagement feedback graph on the dashboard. This allows educators to view these two form results side-by-side.
User Testing
We conducted 3 user testings on the mid-fidelity prototype. In each test, we facilitated the participants to navigate the screens with 6 tasks and after each task, they share their interpretations and feedback with us. We got some interesting insights from them:
“It would be more efficient if I can do some interactions such as double-clicking on the calendar to add unit/lesson.”
“The layout of the calendar is confusing and unfamiliar to me. I feel more comfortable with a typical monthly view.”
“It’s better to give me some preliminary tips first before giving me deeper insights. This way, I am more willing to wait.” - Expect tips to be instantaneous given the world we live in. Suggest that we can maybe have two types of tips - one immediate vs. another that needs time to be processed.
Client Feedback
1. Make student engagement the top priority on the dashboard and expand results shown by subscale.
2. “I'm wondering if we could show in progress survey stats? I'm also wondering if users can choose the subscales on the graph too.”
3. Improve the UI of the dropdown boxes for student preferences (inventory) and refine details in the goals section to make it more clear.
4. “Change the color scheme based on our design system.”
5. “For Request a Tip, I think it makes sense for it to be an action button like the new survey button (but make it a blue button). Bring more attention to it as they may be using it more often?”
5. “For Request a Tip, I think it makes sense for it to be an action button like the new survey button (but make it a blue button). Bring more attention to it as they may be using it more often?”
Final Deliverable
High-F Prototype
Improvements
Student Engagement Results
Before, we have it under the calendar section and the section only shows a line graph with limited details. We moved it to the top section to make it more prominent. We added more stats of total surveys issued, student responses, and surveys in progress to show surveys’ status more clearly. Instead of showing only a line graph, we added subscale buttons as filters and allowed more user interactions on the graph. When the user hovers over the line, they can see more detailed scores of the subscale on a point
Calendar
Before, users can switch between weekly and monthly views. And, we layout the months horizontally, which might be unfamiliar to users as it is different from a typical calendar. Above the calendar, users can choose to add units, add lessons, and request a tip. On the calendar, users can see their unit plan and lesson content. They can also get access to the student feedback and the tips they requested in a specific month.
After, we moved the section to the place below the student engagement result section. To make the calendar more sense, users can now switch between monthly and yearly views instead of weekly and monthly views. We decided on using a calendar format that is similar to the LMS software that they currently use to increase learnability, memorability, and intuitiveness for educators. On the calendar, we allowed more users interactions such as clicking on the white space to add units or add lessons. We kept the content of units, lessons, student feedback, and tips on the calendar but color-coded them to make them more intuitive to users.
Request Tip
We made it so it is much more noticeable on the page, and added a bookmark to add a bit of flair for our client.
Instead of giving educators only the advanced tips, the system gives Immediate tips generated by the tip engine and then gives advanced tips afterward.
Educator Goals
We made the goal category more clear and allow customized goals.
Student Interest Inventory
We refined the drop-down section and improved the “update” button.
