Ulearn
Digital literacy training application for Senior Australians
Background
A university project in collaboration with The University of the Third Age (U3A), an institution for the education and stimulation of mainly retired members of the community in Melbourne, VIC. The aim of this project was to address the digital exclusion of seniors by improving their digital literacy. The proposed solution was an engaging and gamification-inspired digital skills learning platform concept directed toward helping seniors learn existing digital platforms
Project year :
Client :
Tools used :
2022
University of Third Age, Victoria, Melbourne
Figma, Protopie
My role :
UX research, UI designing and prototyping
Developing design system
Given the problem space, we quickly learned that there was a pressing need to create a platform that would not be confined to merely learning online pharmacy module (as per the brief need), but rather a framework that could accommodate any module the client wished to introduce.
The module's learning process has been divided into multiple tasks, each with various pre-learning modules and a challenge at the end that duplicates a scenario and asks the user to apply their learnings. Because each user has a unique amount of prior knowledge, the entire learning process was intended to be flexible, allowing users to skip any level they like.
The challenge:
Seniors often do not keep pace with rapid technological changes and experience problems with online activities such as online shopping, online banking, health, and e-government among others that younger generations take for granted. Those aged 65+ are the least digitally able age group in Australia and the lack of digital literacy among seniors and its associated impact on social exclusion is a pressing issue in contemporary Australian society.
How might we address the digital exclusion of seniors?
Understanding the problem
Speaking with the senior citizens (members of U3A) allowed us to better understand the challenges being faced by senior people in their everyday lives while using a digital platform. Shaping connections provided us with personas to better understand user pain points.
Developing ideas & user flow
Sketching some low-fidelity screens to identify task flow and user flow
Gamifying the experience
To make the learning process more engaging, we took inspiration from gamification. Keeping in mind the helping nature of our users, we came up with the concept "Learn by helping". Users are made to choose a character first and then asked to help character with a particular task, which is presented to them in for of a challenge. User experience is further elevated by making use of positively enforced feedbacks.
Making an adaptive platform
Although our focus was mobile first approach, given the nature of concept structure, a desktop version can be developed with ease.
Design concept prototype
Based on identified user flow and taking inspiration from the moodpboard, high fidelity screens were developed
Final thoughts
Working with client made me realise the that majority of the applications are not designed keeping I mind senior citizens and the accessibility challenges that comes with the senior age group. Throughout this project, accessibility features in terms of legibility and readability were the key focus areas. This made us take into consideration the WCAG compliance which the client highly appreciated. Finally, gamification being our key theme made me learn how to we can motivate users to perform a particular task while making the whole experience a memorable one.
Keeping accessibility at forefront
Keeping the target customers age in mind, the application designed to not only meet WCAG standards but also include several other accessibility features such as speak, bookmark and type size control.
