Due: Shipping an education tool for kids who get stuck
ROLE
Product Designer
UX Researcher
TIMELINE
Sept - Dec 2024
8 weeks
TEAM
1 PM
2 Developers
SKILLS
0 → 1 Product Design
User Testing
OUTCOMES
Students completed homework independently without parent frustration
From tears to confidence → students tackle homework solo.
Shipped and tested with 40+ students across 6 schools
Iterative testing completed based on data from California public school students.
PROBLEM
Teachers are not 24/7 tutors.
I’m the daughter of a public school teacher, so I know how teachers stretch themselves thin to accommodate 30 different learning styles with zero extra time.
Meanwhile, parents aren’t guaranteed to transform into perfect tutors in every household.
Assessment valued more than actual learning
Students are more inclined to cheat in order to get credit rather than actually understanding the concepts.
This issue is most prevalent at the middle school level– the crucial transition stage between the academic hand holding of elementary school and the independence of high school.
SOLUTION PREVIEW
A homework tool tailored to individual student learning styles, that also understands classroom context
RESEARCH
Building a data-driven product
Letting teachers and students tell us what their problems are.
27
interviews
conducted
10
competitors tested + researched
6
schools
visited
Not every student can afford a private tutor
After cramming my schedule full of calls with students and teachers across all grade levels, I discovered how overwhelmed both parties were.
Notion doc tracking interview status and notes
Mrs. Song
9th grade teacher, 20 years experience
"By the time I grade papers, respond to parent emails, and prep for tomorrow's lessons, it's 9 PM. I can't be available when kids are doing homework at 7PM and getting stuck."
Ms. Demeuse
6th grade teacher, 14 years experience
“I'll explain atom structure one way, and 10 kids get it. Then I try a visual approach, and maybe 8 more understand. But there's always a few kids who need something completely different”
Teachers don’t have bandwith...
Teachers want to see kids succeed, don’t have the time or resources to help every student individually.
Keeping track of individual student progress can be difficult.
Students need tailored help
Not every student has tutors or parents at home who can sit down and help them.
Children can have vastly different preferred learning styles– visual, auditory, reading & writing, etc.
Competitors lack proactive teaching & reliability
Tools require teachers to be actively monitoring or are simply a host for static assignments. I saw an opportunity for a highly proactive and teacher-trusted tool.
How might we bridge the gap between in-class learning and at home understanding?
SOLUTION
01
Teacher uploads their materials
Due parses the lessons plans, answer keys and homework to create an assignment tailored to the in-class content.
02
Students are assigned HW
All questions are directly contextual to what was taught in class.
03
Our friendly mascot Duey gives a nudge
Variety of question input types to keep students engaged.
04
Teachers receive key insights
Dashboard with data for each student + overall class understanding stats that highlight areas that may need to be covered again.
FEATURE EXPLORATION
Accommodating for learning styles
Due defaults to their preferred learning style, but all options are available. Includes written, visual, and auditory (in the form of a story).
You can always check the source
If students want to dig deeper, they can always reference the source material given by the teacher (ex. textbooks, study guides, notes).
USER TESTING
Back to middle school!
Our team may or may not have skipped classes to spend our days at K-12 public schools to test Due with real students.
I ran usability tests with students, having them complete a sample assignment on Due while I watched them interact with the product to identify pain points.
ITERATIONS AFTER TESTING
Navigation with visual progress
Exploring how students navigate through questions
7
Why is the Mitochondria known as the powerhouse of the cell?
Almost there!
FUN FACT!
The “energy” being produced is called ATP!
Send
Because it produces the energy the cell uses
BIOLOGY
Organelles Homework
BEFORE
Manually clicking between pages
Students couldn’t visually see their progress or how many questions remained, leaving them frustrated.
Why is the Mitochondria known as the powerhouse of the cell?
Almost there!
FUN FACT!
The “energy” being produced is called ATP!
Send
Because it produces the energy the cell uses
BIOLOGY
Organelles Homework
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
AFTER
Nav shows progress
Progress bar shows which questions have been started and how many are left.
Optimal side bar view
Menu placement explorations
BEFORE
Floating pop-up menu
The first corner pop-up worked as a simple nav, but didn't show have any sense of information hierarchy.
AFTER
Left-aligned sidebar
Students we talked with primarily used Chromebooks in class and were more familiar with the layout patterns of Google Classroom, Drive, Docs, etc.
The left navigation allows for familiarity and a more detailed view.
Answering questions before they’re asked
Reducing friction in students’ follow up questions
Why is the Mitochondria known as the powerhouse of the cell?
Almost there!
FUN FACT!
The “energy” being produced is called adenosine triphosphate (ATP)
what even is a triphosphate????
Send
Because it produces the energy the cell uses
BIOLOGY
Organelles Homework
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
BEFORE
Asking excessive follow ups
Especially with new vocabulary or difficult concepts, follow up questions were almost always about asking for clarification.
How does it work?
Give an example!
Show me a picture!
AFTER
Follow-up suggestions
Highlight vocab words and provide common follow-up questions to nudge students in the right direction.
Creating a better learning experience than generic LLMs
It’s important to create a balance between too much trust and no trust at all.
With a younger audience who is not as familiar with AI, much less any sort of prompt engineering, it's important to provide multiple options while still giving them the agency to steer the conversation.
VISUAL DESIGN
Playful, but clean branding!
As the sole designer, I was also responsible for the branding of Due. My goal was to create a clean and simple identity that still maintained a touch of playfulness.
I was also in charge of creating fun merch to give out to the 200+ guests who attended Demo Night. My expertise from years of running my small business came in handy :)
REFLECTION
My takeaways
Edtech = many stakeholders
Students, teachers, parents, and admins all have different needs. Don't gloss over any stakeholders.
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Include devs in the design process
Not every design is feasible to develop on such a tight timeline. Be flexible!
Fail fast
Talk to users!!! If an idea doesn’t work/isnt needed, its okay to scrap it and move onto the next one.
If given more time…
Gather engagement metrics
HW completion rates (baseline v.s. Due), follow up question frequency, HW score improvements.
Parent interviews
Better understand the parent perspective since they often deal with HW frustration at home.
Scalability for different grade levels
Testing how our interaction patterns work across different subjects and grades,
Thank you!
Huge shout out to my team, mentors, and all the friends at USC LavaLab
We all learned so much from each other and there’s no one else I would have wanted to take on this journey with!
