Reducing Friction
Quick links
What is friction?
Here’s an explanation of friction from Berkeley instructor Aurum Kathuria: “Friction is the amount of effort required to take an action. If something has low friction, people are likely to do it. If something has a lot of friction, people are unlikely to do it.” Kathuria notes how even minor simplifications to online interfaces can have huge impacts. He gives the example of software company Chargebee. The company allowed users to sign up with one piece of info – their email address – rather than four (company, email, password, confirm password). That small change led to a 100% increase in paying customers.
Online learning and teaching (OLT) is full of friction, and reducing it is not always easy. The following changes may require more work for you, the instructor, but will make things easier for your students. Remember to be patient, and to apply changes to your pedagogy over time.
Simple course design
One easy way to reduce friction is with clear course design. The less time students have to spend figuring out how to navigate the course site and looking for instructions, files, and so on, the more time they can spend focusing on their work. This is why research repeatedly links effective course design with positive learning outcomes.
Look at the examples of clear course design below or visit the actual sites. Note how few things there are to click on, the limited amounts of text, and the visual appeal.
Hyperlinks
Hyperlinks help students easily navigate course sites and find what they are looking for. Do students need a reading to complete an assignment? Don’t just hide that reading in a folder under ‘files’. Include a link to it every time you talk about that reading or the assignment to which it pertains.
Note how this prompt links out to everything students might need, from source material, guides, models, and related assignments.
Multimodality
Another way to create user-friendly course sites and create engagement is to balance out text with other modes of communication, in particular, images and video. There's a reason that "I see" can mean "I understand" - a third of our brains is devoted to vision. If a picture is worth a thousand words, just think what a video is worth! Here are some ways to incorporate visual elements.
Roadmaps and visual syllabi
Digital learning expert Rita-Marie Conrad suggests instructors make visual versions of schedules and syllabi. This helps students comprehend how courses are organized and visualize their progress.
Instructors can create their own syllabi and roadmap templates on Piktochart or Lucidchart or cheaply purchase them at teacherspayteachers.com.
Multimodal assignments
Every aspect of an assignment, from instructions, to research, to the end product can be multimodal. Berkeley instructor Kaya Oakes likes to write brief prompts for assignments and accompany them with videos of herself elaborating on the assignment and offering suggestions. She also has students synthesize readings, videos, and audio as they prepare to write. Finally, students submit work that includes multiple modes of communication.
No need to do it all yourself
Students can share the work of gathering multimodal assets for classes. Why not task them with finding a video that relates to a reading, an image that represents an assignment, or creating a visual roadmap for a course module?
Readability
For those things that cannot be expressed visually, be sure to use easy-to-understand, concise language. That way, students can focus on what you want them to do rather than what you are trying to say.
Use tools like the Hemingway App, online-utility.org, or The Writer to measure the readability of your instructions, messages to students, and so on, and keep the following grade level averages in mind:
Shakespeare - 12
Harvard Law Review - 11
The Financial Times - 10
BBC - 9
President Obama's speeches - 8
Harry Potter books - 6
If your students have trouble reading the Harvard Law Review or Shakespeare, they might have trouble understanding your course site as well if the language is too wordy.
Remember that readability relates to font as well. Research shows that San Serif fonts are easiest on the eyes; that's why they are standard in Gmail and many other platforms.
Asynchronous learning
Asynchronous instruction reduces friction. It allows students to work around their existing schedules and deal with access issues, such as limited bandwidth or a lack of basic technology, which affect 1 in 5 students. As noted on the Home Page, synchronous instruction has benefits as well, so the solution may be to create a hybrid model.
One way to do that is with asynchronous tasks and synchronous check-ins. Instructors can assign readings, assignments, discussion posts and so on at beginning of a week, module, unit of study, etc., due at end of that week / module / unit. Students can complete those tasks at their own pace / schedule. But during each week, module, or unit, instructors can require students to participate in synchronous check-ins. Students might, for instance, be required to attend virtual office hours, or participate in a group chat with classmates.
image credit: arc.dev
The more flexible these check-ins are, the less friction there will be for students. A student with bandwidth issues, for instance, may be unable to join a video chat but able to speak on the phone. An international student might be prevented by firewalls from using one company's communication software but not another's. She may also only be available early in the morning, due to time zone differences, while another student with a job and small child may only be available in the early evening. As long as the instructors remain flexible about how and when they check in with students, everyone can reap the benefits of real time, synchronous learning without sacrificing the flexibility that OLT offers.
Learner tech-readiness, or lack thereof
We often believe that young learners are tech-savvy. We may picture a child showing his grandfather how to send an email. But research suggests that the younger generation is not as tech savvy as we may think, or familiar with some tools (like video filters on social media apps) but not the ones needed for academic success (like how to submit assignments on a learning management system).
And this is important, because learners who are not accustomed to using the Internet and computers to complete schoolwork are more likely to struggle in OLT.
Instructors who are struggling with tech themselves should not feel they need to train students to become tech wizards. But they do need to be flexible and design courses in a way that novice tech users can succeed in them.
image credit: technofaq.org
Here are some ways to do so:
Offer alternatives. Is a student having trouble submitting a document? Why not allow him to submit an audio recording he makes on his phone instead? If a student lacks the bandwidth to join a video chat, would a conversation on a text-based platform like Google Chat suffice?
Remember that students may look at course sites, slides, etc. on their phones. Do so yourself to see how things look and if everything is still accessible.
Keep videos to 15 minutes or fewer so as to prevent download issues and learner distraction. For longer videos, try breaking them down into chunks, or indicating which parts students should focus on.
Include 'how to' links. If you want students to use Screentips, for example, direct them to a site with instructions on how to do so.
Meet with an instructional design expert. Most institutions have them, but only a quarter of faculty take advantage. How can we expect students to make use of resources if we don't do so ourselves?
The Power of Positivity
Finally, remember that online learning can be tiring and frustrating for everyone, and that an extra dose of positivity always helps.
image credit: nytimes.com
For instance, a statement like:
I see a lot of you haven't completed this week's quiz. Remember that this will hurt your grade!
can be rephrased to something more positive like:
Remember that quizzes help prepare you for upcoming assignments and help me understand how you're doing in the class.
To objectively assess the tone of your communication with students, try IBM's Watson personality insights. Just copy and paste a body of text into the demo window and see what aspects of tone the program identifies.
image credit: medium.com
