As online education has become popular, more and more tryouts are made to use virtual spaces such as the Metaverse and AR/VR for educational purposes. However, these attempts have mainly focused on the students' environmental factors. I thought there would be a way to use avatars as a helpful factor in education as well.
For the project, I conducted a user interview for further understanding of foreign language practice to discover insight. Based on the insights I gathered, I researched ‘Shadowing’, investigating how to use this avatar system to enhance the efficiency of practicing speaking in a foreign language.
One of my key findings from the interviews was 'Shadowing,' a language learning technique where people repeat what their role-model says. Also, through research, I learned about Live Action Role-Playing education, in which students act on the role they chose. Both techniques shared a common factor for learning practices, which is acting. I thought by using the avatar, I could amplify the effect of acting to enhance student's speaking skills.
Make sure the users do not feel awkward so that they can focus on acting
UI elements and the user flow should not disturb concentration
Before designing the screens, I planned out the user flow of the service. Then I performed user testing on my target audience to see if it was easy to understand. After doing multiple user tests with the prototypes, I created the final design for this project.
Users can choose the language they want to practice and view courses they wish to try. The clips they choose are listed on the left side of the page.
Users can see detailed information about the clip and select the character they want to act.
After choosing a role, users can practice speaking a foreign language by following each step.
After submitting the final recording, users can view the overall score and see which parts they can improve.
