A better spelling app
There are a lot of crappy spelling apps out in the app store. I decided to make a face for a new app. Welcome to my process to a better spelling app.
The first step:
know what's out there.
Knowing what is out in the industry is a big part of my process. I need to know how it's being done, what's not being done, and where I might improve or change.
Findings
I found (on the free apps) that you cant add your own spelling list, listen to the word, and feedback and tracking are poor if they existed at all. I also found that a lot of the apps are poorly designed. With distracting colors and user interfaces that are not easy to pick up.
Now that I know:
Now that I know what is being used I can start to sketch out ideas.
This is a skeleton that I ended with. I kept in mind that I wanted a spelling app that a user could.
- make their own list.
- hear the words on the list
- see progress on each spelling list.
- easy to use (focusing on younger groups, main users, and parents as secondary users.
- The design is not distracting or ugly.
The landing screen, when opening the app, gives you three options. 1 make a new list. 2 edit an existing list/view progress. 3 go to an existing list.
When making a list you can do 2 things. 1 make a word/remove a word and 2 record yourself. I ended up going with recording yourself because it gives the most options for the parent. Say the word, use a sentence, brake the work into its syllables, speak a different language.
Editing a list lets you add words, take words away, hide words, randomize words or delete the list. When in editing mode you can also see the stats on that list:
How many attempts, on each word and the list as a whole.
The spelling of each word
I say attempts because they can try at the same word as many times as they want. When submitting the spelling all it will tell them is yes you got it with green or try again with red. They are never locked out of a word, even when they pass a word to spell the next they can always go back.
Which leads to the last function
Spelling
From the first skeleton sketch, I was working to keep it simple. Little to no words big easy to use buttons. I wanted any user to pick this up and know right away how to use it.
After doing some user testing and talking to friends I was able to find out some things. “The balance felt off” was common feedback. So I was able to find out that the hierarchy of buttons was off. I had two competing buttons. I also thought that if I wanted other languages to use this without a problem I would want as little words(English) as possible.
With these two problems in mind, I changed things.
Iteration with trial and error
I did it! I found a more simple way to explain what the buttons did! I got rid of all the words and I found out one more thing in the process I forgot to take pictures of! wayfinding in the quiz! The all-blue design on the left is what I ended with. A simple check for checking the spelling, arrows showing back forward and up? Up is to get out of that page. The ear everyone got even little children wanted to hear something when they clicked the button.
Now I had one more change that needs to happen. Change the all-blue design. This was harder for me to do than I thought it would be. I have no pre-made color pallet I had to follow because of a company. This is purely my design!
As you can see I went through a lot of different color combinations. During the process of picking colors, that were lighter in shade to help calm the mind and keep distractions low, then I would ask different people what they liked and why? There was a lot of feedback on the fleshy colors for the ear and for baby blues and greens. In the end, I went with a color pallet and design that reminds me of 50’s adds. This design, although older looking, has colors that are calming and they also invite your eyes to focus on the right areas naturally. The rest of the app is in process of development and there are sure to be more changes made during that.
