This is a user-led informational tool on the history and current impact of the ukulele. Learners explore topics at their own pace and in the order of their choosing.
Audience: Users seeking information about the ukulele
Responsibilities: Instructional Design, eLearning Development, Visual Design, Storyboard, and Mockups
Tools Used: Storyline 360, Google Docs, Mind Meister
Many people know about the ukulele, not many know it's origins, variations, and impacts on modern music. This eLearning experience would be useful for customers seeking to learn more about this unique instrument.
An attractive user-led eLearning experience would allow each consumer to explore the material uniquely and pique their interest.
This course was designed to teach people more about the ukulele. I started with the most relevant topics that would encourage people to want to learn more about and possibly play the ukulele. I then wrote a text-based storyboard, designed visual mockups, developed a prototype, and ultimately created the finished product.
I planned out my course using a text-based storyboard based partially on Gagne's 9 Events. I concentrated on gaining the audience's attention through a fun and friendly beach format along with an interactive ukulele as a selection tool. To present the content I made the selection tool open ended so users could navigate the material in whatever order they prefer. This kind of pull vs push format gives users more control and buy-in.
As this was a concept project, I decided to do my visual mockups directly in Storyline 360. This allowed me to get creative with my design process while ensuring everything worked smoothly once prototyped and finalized. Receiving feedback from peers allowed me to fine tune my mockups to be more and more learner-friendly and attractive.
Using my storyboard and mockups I was able to smoothly complete the project in Articulate 360. I was especially proud of the animations and highlighting triggers that subtly guide the user through the project.
I am proud of the unique design of the project. Users that I shared this project with appreciated that they could navigate the menu in any order to drive their own experience. They also commented on the mix of fun attractive graphics with clean design.
This project was inspired by instructional design community challenges to create an experience involving a dial and a more learner-led experience. In following these deign constraints I made a fresh and engaging product. This helped me see the value of meeting the challenges that each new project brings and how those challenges help you grow as a designer.
I went through many iterations of this project before the final result. I got feedback from others that guided me to adding certain features and tweaking others to make things more intuitive for the learner. I learned a lot about sticking to high standards of design and user-friendliness while refining my product.
I am confident with the new skills this project added to my repertoire and pleased with the creative final product.
