Lexo
A learning aid for for Dyslexic children to help them overcome phonological deficit and
grow their reading and spelling skills to grade level.
Reading is fundamental to functioning in today's society. For many children with reading disabilities, this skill is one of the most difficult and a life long issue. Dyslexia is one of the familiar types of reading difficulties, literally meaning a ‘difficulty with words’. Dyslexia is mainly a problem with reading accurately and fluently. It affects 1 out of 5 children. Impacts reading, spelling and writing. The words can not be decoded down to sounds thus there is issue mapping the letter form to sound which causes errors in reading and spelling.
"What happens to education after a child is diagnosed with Dyslexia?"
Design Challenge
It takes a dyslexic children, if he/she is assessed or diagnosed early in school years, about 2 years of special education if the child attends remedial classes with special educators for 4 times a week. This process takes a very long time as the child has also lots of behavioral and psychological issues that comes with frustration and anxiety associated with Dyslexia. Due to lack of awareness, social stigma attached to learning disability and a large number of primary teacher left un-trained, child's reading abilities further suffer more and more . Under such scenario special learning centres come into picture where child gets individual attention and learning programs The project aims at understanding the nuances in dyslexic teaching and to attempt design intervention in order to bridge the main challenges like 'phonological deficit' with dyslexia reducing the time it takes for a child to read and spell fluently while studying at learning centres or at home and school, with the main objective of making dyslexic learning fun and engaging for maximum impact.
Victor widell's dyslexia simulation (below)
Design Process
The process involved special educators and children throughout the course of the project and they took active part in evaluation of intermediate and iterated concepts. The focus was to analyse how dyslexic kids behave and consume remediation in one to one sessions with special educators, their preferences and learning patterns.
Iterative user studies
From the very start I have involved children and special educators into brainstorming and feedback sessions to test and iterate parallel to my project timeline. This led to better clarity and focused user centered design approach. Teacher-student sessions were observed both as a silent observer manner and semi structured interviews. children were exposed to early prototypes to set a focused direction in concept design.
User studies analysis
Data was compiled and insights were prioritized. Audio and video recording were re looked at to cancel any biases. Artifacts such as child diaries, teachers's notes, assessment notes were analyzed to capture user needs.
Design implications and intervention opportunities
Case Studies: Existing applications and teaching methods were studies and pros and cons were analyzed to contribute to refined design considerations and create the final approach.
Design Considerations
Rapid Prototyping
Got users(educators and children) involved early in the design process with quick and inexpensive paper prototypes. Uncovered usability issues and validated design decisions based on actual user reactions and feedbacks.
Final concept
With numerous testing and feedback sessions, the final concept focused on a learning system that will not only aid educators in the special education for dyslexic children but will also serve as a medium to measure their growth.
The approach was discussed with user and the system details were refined.
Ecosystem:
- The ecosystem will be contain children and educator .
- Teacher will keep track of child’s progress at center and parents at home, they will share child's progress with each other and the assessment will also help in keeping child’s progress in check with school also.
- The child will feel more in control of his learning and will grow with the lessons
UI flow
Key steps:
- Break down the concept into the very basics. Use lesson plans to establish tasks and structured progress.
- Create quick consumables/exercises for revision and memory building
- Chunk the exercises into further consumables. Like train the children on a single vowel first.
Animated guide to help children understand how to perform task with audio instruction by the helpful robot 'Robu'. This makes the experience more personal and engaging.
After developing the working prototype and fixing few glitches, the app was developed with tablet as form factor integrated in a learning center environment. The educator initially guides the child and later the child takes the task on her own.
Tasks for evaluating the prototype:
•Participant completing a lesson - Students starts with daily revision and new words and saves what is learnt.
•Participant completing a task and access diary to revise the word
•Going back to task and navigating to the next task.
•Use audio instructions for navigation in the interface.
•Write a word on notebook after using the learning aid.
After multiple evaluation sessions the design was validated and prototype was further I have thought of possibilities with tactile user interfaces that are not constrained by the interface or screen size.This project can be further developed to be part of a full scaled application that can be installed in schools computers to assist teacher in helping children that are struggling or have learning disorders.
Thank you for reading!
