Week 7 : Information Design

In this week we learned about information design in a website. Information design is to clarifying your communication goals and arranging your ideas into a design that serves those goals. In other words is flowchart of your website. When designing information for website, we must considered 5 things that are (1)message (2)audience (3)purpose (4)background and (5)structure.

For example in developing our website, we have been discussed in group to use Problem Based Learning Strategy for our website. So, we have to deliver content of our website based on strategy we choose. We also created flowchart for our website so that we know that the website we develop is in a right path and align with our goals.

In the end of the class, Dr. Dayana given time for us to discuss our group project : Website Development and asked us to sketch our website and upload in e-learning. Since right now, i dont have copy of the sketches, later i will upload the image of the sketches in this blog.

Here , the image of our group sketches.

Content Page

Homepage

Week 6 : Interaction Design

In this week, we need to independent study since Dr. Dayana having a fever. Hope Dr. Dayana get well soon :) .Dr. Dayana had uploaded Interaction Design notes in e-learning and she's given a task to us which is we need to do a mind map from it on a piece of A4 paper and then scan and upload it in e-learning. I've go through the notes and do the mind map. Here is the image of my mind map:

What i've learned about interaction design is it has 3 essential elements for an effective interaction. The 3 elements are (1)organization (2) navigation and (3) interactivity.

(1)Organization – How the information will be organized on the pages ?
(2)Navigation – How people will find their way around your web site ?
(3)Interactivity – What controls you give your users to work with ?

These 3 elements are important when designing interactivity in the website. This will make the user not feeling lost in the website and knows what are they looking for.

Week 5 : Basic Web Design

In week 5, we learned about basic web design and the do and the don't like about website. In this class, Dr. Dayana discussed the difference of website in couple years ago and today's website. There are many difference as we compared the couple years ago of website would have such a big banner while today's website mostly using slide banner. Design in today's website more modern and mostly using at least three colors as it will look neat and nice. However, there are also many websites today still not following the basic guide in web design. There are website which is too messy and not proper organize the content of their website.

Designing an effective web site needs more than just collecting information and simply post it on the web . There are guides and rules must be followed when designing a website. I searched on Google and i found this article about 10 principles of effectice web design (http://uxdesign.smashingmagazine.com/2008/01/31/10-principles-of-effective-web-design/). The 10 principles are:

(1)Don't make users think
(2)Don’t squander users’ patience
(3)Manage to focus users’ attention
(4)Strive for feature exposure
(5)Make use of effective writing
(6) Strive for simplicity
(7)Don’t be afraid of the white space
(8)Communicate effectively with a “visible language”
(9)Conventions are our friends
(10)Test early, test often

For, further elaboration about the principles, you can go to link above.

Today's class, we have to compared the best website and the worst website that we like. I choose 'Apple' website for the best website while 'Math is Fun' for the worst website.

I like the Apple website because the main page of the website have such a big ad which promoting their latest product. The big advertising board in Apple website makes the consumer update the latest product and can make their heart desire for it. They are using good marketing in promotion their new product. Other than that, this website using 3 main colors which are white, black and grey. The navigation of this website is good and you will not lost in this website. The website also have enough white space so that the consumer will not feel heavy as in this website contains large image of their products. Overall, it is a best website in my opinion.

On contrast with Math is Fun Website. It is an educational website which specifically in Mathematics for K-12. The website is a bit messy as in the content of the website is too many in one page and you have to scroll down more than 3 pages. The content of the website also not been arrange neatly. As the image sometimes in the left side or center of the page and there is no consistency in arranging the content neatly. However, the design of this website still can be improved since the content of the websites are useful for educational purposes.

Week 4 : Project Management in Web Design and Production

In this week, we learned about project management in web design and production. Project management in web design takes three process (1) planning, (2) constructing and (3) testing. The three process can be called pre-production, production and post production.

In pre production, there are involve analysis, planning and design such as creating blueprint for the website. While in production (construction process), there are involve content research, interface design, graphic development, audio recording, video production and web authoring. For

post production, testing and evaluation are conducted. The testing can be done on content, functional testing and usability testing.

So, when you're developing a website, all of the process above will be involved. This will makes your work run smoothly and organize.

For group discussion this week, we've been given a task to find out about problem solving strategy when conduct in teaching and learning in school. Problem solving strategy is one of learning strategy. There are many types of learning strategy such as game based learning, inquiry based learning, problem based learning, collaborative learning and many more.

In a group of three which is Junaidah, Cikgu Fid. and me. We've been discussed about problem solving strategy and we write it on a piece of paper. We googled and find out that the problem solving strategy is consists of four main things (1) Plan (2) Do (3) Check and (4) Act.  Below is what we have done.