TY - GEN
T1 - Get realistic! - UCD course design and evaluation
AU - Larusdottir, Marta
AU - Roto, Virpi
AU - Stage, Jan
AU - Lucero, Andres
PY - 2019/1/1
Y1 - 2019/1/1
N2 - There is an increasing demand for software, suitable for large segments of users with different needs and competences. User-Centred Design (UCD) methods have been used in the software industry and taught to software developers to meet the various needs of users. The field of UCD covers a broad set of topics that can be covered in a range of courses with various content. In this paper we describe the design of a two-week course focusing on teaching UCD methods to students with various backgrounds that are useful for the students in the future. The course schedule included lectures and workshop activities where the lecturers taught UCD topics and coached the students in developing skills for using the selected UCD methods during the course to design and evaluate an interactive system. Additionally, we describe two types of course evaluations that we conducted: qualitative weekly evaluations and a post-course survey. The results show that students were in general positive about the course content and the combination of lectures and workshop activities. Hi-fi prototyping was the UCD method that the students rated as being most useful for the course and their future. They particularly liked how realistic these were for the users. The least useful method in the course and in the future was “Walking the Wall”, where students read an affinity diagram and make design suggestions. Finally, we suggest changes for a prospective course, based on the results of the evaluations.
AB - There is an increasing demand for software, suitable for large segments of users with different needs and competences. User-Centred Design (UCD) methods have been used in the software industry and taught to software developers to meet the various needs of users. The field of UCD covers a broad set of topics that can be covered in a range of courses with various content. In this paper we describe the design of a two-week course focusing on teaching UCD methods to students with various backgrounds that are useful for the students in the future. The course schedule included lectures and workshop activities where the lecturers taught UCD topics and coached the students in developing skills for using the selected UCD methods during the course to design and evaluate an interactive system. Additionally, we describe two types of course evaluations that we conducted: qualitative weekly evaluations and a post-course survey. The results show that students were in general positive about the course content and the combination of lectures and workshop activities. Hi-fi prototyping was the UCD method that the students rated as being most useful for the course and their future. They particularly liked how realistic these were for the users. The least useful method in the course and in the future was “Walking the Wall”, where students read an affinity diagram and make design suggestions. Finally, we suggest changes for a prospective course, based on the results of the evaluations.
KW - Computer science curricula
KW - Course design
KW - Course evaluation
KW - User centred design course
KW - User centred design methods
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85059938849&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1007/978-3-030-05909-5_2
DO - 10.1007/978-3-030-05909-5_2
M3 - Article in proceeding
AN - SCOPUS:85059938849
SN - 9783030059088
T3 - Lecture Notes in Computer Science
SP - 15
EP - 30
BT - Human-Centered Software Engineering - 7th IFIP WG 13.2 International Working Conference, HCSE 2018, Revised Selected Papers
A2 - Lárusdóttir, Marta Kristín
A2 - Winckler, Marco
A2 - Kuusinen, Kati
A2 - Palanque, Philippe
A2 - Bogdan, Cristian
PB - Springer
T2 - 7th International Working Conference on Human-Centered Software Engineering, HCSE 2018
Y2 - 3 September 2018 through 5 September 2018
ER -