Needs Assessment Document

I. Purpose and Introduction:

The purpose of the team’s needs assessment was to identify accessibility and usability issues in order to determine the design implications for the LiteracyAccess Online site. Therefore, to obtain several perspectives and determine the performance gap, we targeted a variety of users, including professionals and parents, through usability testing of the Phase 4 prototype. Also, we used Pre and Post Survey data, which compared and analyzed the interactions between facilitators and reading partners. This allowed us to determine the improvements that needed to be made in regards to the universal design of the website.

Listed below are four goals that were established during the performance analysis for Phase 5 of LAO. Statements supporting each goal have been provided and exemplify the findings that emerged during the needs assessment.

II. Findings

The findings of the needs assessment are based on both the usability testing and the data analysis of the Pre and Post Survey. This section details the results of the data gathered from our target audience of facilitators and students. The results of the qualitative and quantitative data analysis are presented below.

All instruments used to collect data discussed in this section can be

found in the appendix.

In addition to collecting original data, the analyzed extant data

included:

  • Suggestions from experts in the field on the Research Advisory

Panel

  • Also, data was analyzed from student teachers and students who used the site at BGSU on the Pre Survey and Post Survey.

The LAO team gathered current additional information from the following sources:

  • target audience
  • focus groups
  • facilitators and students who had used LAO site.

Below is a list of the type of sources and quality of responses that were

gathered and examined:

Pre Survey

Questions 1 –12 and 46-55:

The typical facilitator is a single female from 22 to 25 years old and of European Descent. A majority of the facilitators live in a small town, city, or suburb and primarily speak English. Most are university students who are still completing their undergraduate degrees. They have some experience in teaching literacy and help children on a voluntary basis. Most facilitators rated themselves as being comfortable at providing reading and writing prompts. They feel that they are able to select materials off the Internet and redirect student’s attention/behavior to stay on task. The facilitators are comfortable at providing computer guidance.

The reading partners rated themselves as below average at reading, writing, and learning new words. They feel secure at using pictures and other cues to read.

Questions 13-23:

Out of 38 facilitators surveyed, all of them have some computer skills; most of the facilitators are at an intermediate level. More than half of the facilitators use their computers every day and have at least 2 computers in the household. Facilitators’ primary use of the computer is for the Internet and work. Their primary use of the Internet is for email and research.

Of the facilitators surveyed, only six of them do not have Internet access at home. In the past, only one facilitator has never used any kind of assistive technology before.

Of the 37 facilitators who have used assistive technology, the assistive technology used the most was spell check. More than half of the facilitators will not be using assistive technology and work with the LAO site at school. Of the 38 facilitators surveyed, all of them have had some kind of experience cutting and pasting text or pictures into a word document and most of them are proficient in this skill set.

Questions 24-34:

The majority of students using the LAO site are nine to ten years old, male, and White/European. Also, these students primarily speak English, are in the fourth grade, and have an identified learning disability. Furthermore, a majority of these students enjoy educational games, need one to two prompts in order to redirect their attention to tasks at hand, and are currently writing at a second grade level. The reading ability of most of these students, however, is at the fourth grade level while the focus of their services at school is on reading in a resource classroom.

Questions 35-45:

Thirty-five out of the 38 students attend public school while thirty-three of them receive Special Education services for part of the day. Twenty-nine of them do not like to read and rarely initiate reading activities. An overwhelming majority of them (35 out of 38) are quite comfortable using the computer. Their primary uses of the computer are for educational games, Internet searches, homework and book reports. Most of them (31 out of 38) can only stay interested and focused for less than thirty minutes.

Expert Data:

A majority of the experts ranked the Literacy Explorer Tool as adequate in presenting user-friendly content and supporting universal accessibility. In particular, the experts felt that the site was beneficial for assisting children in reading and felt that the site supported an excellent relationship between the facilitator and the student, especially in providing instructional strategies. Also, experts equally ranked the LAO site as fair to excellent in supporting a facilitator who has no experience teaching reading and felt that the site was maintained well. However, experts felt that the navigation within the site was fair at best.

Post Survey

Literacy Activities:

Most students were either able to answer the comprehension questions completely or had great difficulty with this task. Also, most students preferred to answer comprehension questions while they were reading. As such, a majority of the students felt that they read very well or very poorly while their writing ability ranged from average to difficult, a finding that was very similar to the results on the Pre-Survey.

The opportunity to predict story events helped the children establish a better understanding of the story. The facilitators reported it boosted the students’ motivation and interest in the story. The sound files helped students make meaning of relevant words, increased fluency, and ensured confidence during reading.

Pre-Reading Activities:

Many reported that the prereading activities assisted the child with vocabulary. They described that these activities helped prepare the students for the story and serviced as an aid to focus their attention. The prereading activities used before being introduced to LAO were discussing book titles, making predictions, identifying a purpose for reading, and making words and story webs.

Reading Prompts:

A majority of the facilitator’s felt that the reading prompts provided within the LiteracyAccess Online site helped their reading partners get past difficult words by providing clues for the students in a variety of formats. For example, sound files provided on the site assisted students in pronouncing various words within the stories while the dictionary links provided students with an opportunity to make multiple meanings of the words in the stories and allowed them to break down words into smaller chunks. Also, the facilitators felt that the pictures within the stories provided students with visual clues while they were reading.

Literacy Explorer Tool:

Similar to the reading prompts that have been provided, a majority of the facilitators felt that the Literacy Explorer tool provided them an opportunity to make reading more enjoyable and independent for the students they work with on the site.

Also, they felt that by reviewing difficult words first, students were able to focus their attention on comprehending the story.

Furthermore, the facilitators felt that they could transfer some of the strategies used in the various prereading, reading, and postreading activities to their reading instruction within their own classroom. In particular, facilitator’s mentioned using pictures within a reading story to have students do picture walks before beginning a reading lesson. Many of the facilitators reported learning aspects of the child’s reading that they didn’t already know before using Literacy Explorer. Some of the skills observed were that the students used pictures to read, their reading was better than facilitators had previous thought, and most students didn’t have experience reading online which was a motivational factor.

Assistive Technologies:

The facilitators reported using several types of assistive technologies. For accessing the computer, they have used Intellikeys and other various adaptive keyboards, switches, and sound-output devices. They have also used communication boards. Finally, facilitators have explored AT such as voice recognition, computer dictionary, text reader, and spell check.

III. Implications:

The following goals reflect the client’s input during a conference call regarding the

project’s direction for Phase 5 of LAO.

GOAL 1: Create a site that is more engaging and interactive for the users:

We will improve the design of the site by:

  • Designing Icons that clearly represent their purpose.
  • Displaying a menu at the top and bottom of each page on the prototype
  • Reducing the enormous amount of information to read prior to joining LAO and during the use of the site . Neilson states that, “Don’t require users to read long continuous blocks of text; instead, use short paragraphs, subheadings, and bulleted lists. Write 50 percent less text. Users don’t like to scroll.” (Nielson, 2000)
  • Providing clear instructions during the registration process (e.g., field for phone number and screen name).

GOAL 2: Ensure compliance with Section 508 Web Standards to enable users with various disabilities full access to LAO.

We will improve the navigation and accessibility by:

  • Displaying links that are visible to the user (e.g., join LAO link)
  • Ensuring the use of assistive technology devices.

GOAL 3: Provide sufficient performance support to ensure usability by people possessing varying levels of technological experience.

We will ensure adequate performance support by:

  • Including navigational prompts so that the user does not get logged off or lost on the site.
  • Providing a HELP feature that guides users through the site when finished with activities or stories.
  • Giving directions and user-friendly language.

GOAL 4: Incorporate best practices in reading in order to improve the design features of the Literary Explorer Tool.

We will improve the design features of the Literary Explorer Tool in the following areas by:

Pre-reading:

  • Using directions that prompt the students to the start of the picture walk component

Reading the story:

  • Adding a variety of engaging pictures within each story
  • Adding stories with varying levels of difficulty.
  • Increasing the amount of immediate feedback after each question

Post-reading:

  • Reducing the amount options to choose from
  • Renaming the Post Activities in more explicit language that students can understand(e.g., Blends and Digraphs)

Content:

  • Adding printable versions of the stories
  • Providing usable resources and a clear purpose of the session planner

IV. Results and Conclusions:

Based upon the information we gathered during the Needs Assessment Process we

concluded the following:

The user and client express the need to:

Establish a clearer navigation of the site

Comply with WAVE Guidelines

Apply alt tags to all graphics

Incorporate a HELP function to the site

Additionally the users state the need to:

Simplify Post Activities

Provide current and up to date stories

Include an introduction explaining the purpose of the site

Provide navigation icons that work.

V. Recommendations:

Once we gained a more comprehensive understanding of the concerns addressed

above we recommend the need to:

Reduce information required to enter site in registration fields

Provide a guest pass for users to investigate LAO before being required to register

Incorporate HELP feature into site tour

Improve the phonics component

Provide consistency in terminology on the site

Prevent password from being displayed on the screen after joining LAO for privacy

issues

Develop less time- consuming activities for the facilitators

Enhance the communication section of the site by:

  • Making a more engaging and interactive discussion forum
  • Include a link on the main navigation for this section of the site
  • Move this section of the site to the same server as LAO
  • Add an “I Agree” button to the navigation section of the communication page in order to force users to read the discussion forum expectations
  • Specify who the expert is in the “E-mail the Expert” section
  • Allow members of the community to self-police each other and provide an incentive for users such as “karma” points

VI. References:

Nielson, J. (2000). Designing web usability. Indianapolis: New Riders.