Retain Case Study
Timeline
6 Weeks August - October
Role
UX/UI Designer
The Problem
Students need to improve their understanding and retention of vocabulary terms because they have limited time to study due to a busy lifestyle.
Vocabulary Flashcards are a great tool but are a hassle to create and carry around. They are also limited in how you can use them to study.
The Solution
Digital Flashcards.
I believe building an app that can quickly create vocabulary terms and definitions, easily organize them, and provide various studying techniques will create a learning experience that gives students better retention and understanding of vocabulary terms they need to study.
Competitive Analysis
Competitors added in complicated extra steps or small difficult to use tools.
Of the common competitors not all were intuitive or easy to use. Quizlet offered the best experience of the competition, but it left room for improvement in the User Flow.
User Interviews
All of my interviewees used flashcards to study new terms and all felt that the flashcards were both a hassle to make and to carry around with them.
They all expressed interest in the ability to input terms into an app that they could take with them on the go and study anywhere.
Interview Questions:
Could you start by telling me about your day to day tasks as a student or professional?
When was the most recent time you had to learn new vocabulary/jargon terms? Were you successful in learning these terms?
Do you have a specific method or technique you use to learn new vocabulary/jargon terms?
The last time you learned new terms, what was the biggest source of frustration?
Have you ever used an App or an Online Resource to help you learn new terms? What did you find most useful about the app? Is there anything that you did not like or would change?
Why do you feel that learning vocabulary/jargon terms is important to your education or profession?
Key Survey Results
80% of survey takers found learning new vocabulary terms to cause stress.
Interview & Survey Major Themes
User Persona
Early Prototypes
Usability Testing & Improvements
In regards to several suggestions and feedback from 5 of my peers and from my mentor, I constantly iterated my design over the period of 2 weeks- with 3 major improvements.
The Final Product
Final Screens
Style Guide
Reflection
This was my first time implementing the Design Thinking Process and it has completely changed the way I approach my work. Below I share some of my key learnings.
Understand the Problem Space. It is essential to understand the problem space before you begin designing. Designing without understanding the problem space leaves you directionless. I personally liked potential user interviews as a great source of information for understanding the problem space. You can’t create a solution without a problem.
Information Architecture sets the Foundation. I also learned that information architecture plays a huge role in usability. Allowing people to find what they want, when they want, and where they want is achieved by having strong information architecture. Building Retain’s information architecture was my favorite part.
Test and Iterate, then Test and Iterate Again. I was blown away by how impactful the usability testing phase was. I thought I had created quite an easy to use and practically ready to go app. I was proven very wrong in all of my user testing sessions! I learned so much and improved my app greatly after these sessions. The Nielsen Rating Scale really helped me to make sense of the feedback and turn it into actionable steps to improve Retain.
Hand Drawn vs. Digital. One challenge I faced during this process that I did not anticipate was creating hand drawn prototypes. Although they are great for getting a general idea of the look and structure I find that creating multiple pages or trying to show how buttons work is much easier and more effectively done with a software like Figma. Digital prototypes allowed me to iterate on ideas faster also by allowing me to create a copy of my design then make changes to it while preserving the original.
Thank you for viewing my work, I learned so much creating Retain!