Designing for Usability
By Peter Berryman, MFA
Georgia Southern University
Have you ever been frustrated navigating a website, finding the information, or completing an online task? Chances are the design did not satisfy the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) definition for usability.
“Usability is the extent to which a product can be used by specified users to achieve specified goals with effectiveness, efficiency, and satisfaction in a specified context of use.” – ISO
Solutions for making the Web usable for everyone revolve around simplicity. By making online instruction easy to perceive, easy to use, and easy to understand, technology becomes less of an obstacle in the learning process.
Usability Design Solutions
Think of your online course as a foreign country. When your students arrive, how will they know where to go? How will they know what to do and when to do it? How will they understand the language of this new and unfamiliar country? By providing students with consistent and familiar landmarks for wayfinding, clear and efficient instructions written at their language level, and easy-to-use technologies, your students will spend more time learning and less time asking for directions because they became lost or disoriented.
