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Personas for Language Learning

We use Personas to define the scope and target audience for our applications. The following personas specifically apply to language learning applications. Since learning is a continuous process where we expect a user to become more proficient, we use the following approach

a Persona defines the characteristics of a user group
the proficiency level of a user is denoted by A, B, and C, which corresponds to the CEF competence levels: Common European Framework of Reference for Languages

Notes about Personas in General

Personas is an established usability practice. Personas should represent the different user types. As such they are an useful tool: They help the designers to step out of their own shoes to figure out users' goals, preferences, limitations and behavior.

A Persona description should consist of behavior patterns, goals, skills, attitudes, and also a description of environment of use. A realistic description brings the persona to life and opens different views to the designer: For example two different personas might approach the same problem from a different angle and probably they would use different ways of action to achieve the same goal. So the same use cases should be possible to do in different ways, depending on the personas skills, behaviour patterns etc.

Language Learning Personas

Tina, the Professional

very motivated to learn a new language (e.g. for job)
also requires very specialized vocabulary

Gan, the Hobby Learner

Somebody who has time to learn a language and does so, since she/he maybe wants to be able to speak basic phrases in the next holidays

just retired
goal is enjoy learning a language, wants to be able to have simple conversations in target language

???, the Student

has to fulfill demands of teachers and pass exams
gets homeworks form teacher
gets vocabulary list
14 years

Others

There are more possible target groups (e.g. learning in class) but currently out of scope.

Proficiency Levels

We define a coarse set of CEFR inspired levels. A level describes what a learner is supposed to be able to do in reading, listening, speaking and writing.

0: Starter

nothing expected

A: Basic User

B: Independent User

C: Proficient User

@@ Line 2: / Line 2: @@
 = Personas for Language Learning =
-We use personas to define the scope and target audience for our applications. The following personas specifically apply to language learning applications. Since learning is a continuous process where we expect a user to become more proficient, we use the following approach
+We use Personas to define the scope and target audience for our applications. The following personas specifically apply to language learning applications. Since learning is a continuous process where we expect a user to become more proficient, we use the following approach
-* a persona defines the characteristics of a user group
+* a Persona defines the characteristics of a user group
-* the proficiency a user is given by the states A, B, and C, according to the [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_European_Framework_of_Reference_for_Languages Common European Framework of Reference for Languages]
+* the proficiency level of a user is denoted by A, B, and C, which corresponds to the CEF competence levels: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Common_European_Framework_of_Reference_for_Languages Common European Framework of Reference for Languages]
 == Notes about Personas in General ==
 Personas is an established usability practice. Personas should represent the different user types. As such they are an useful tool: They help the designers to step out of their own shoes to figure out users' goals, preferences, limitations and behavior.
-A persona description should consist of behavior patterns, goals, skills, attitudes, and also a description of environment of use. A realistic description brings the persona to life and opens different views to the designer: For example two different personas might approach the same problem from a different angle and probably they would use different ways of action to achieve the same goal. So the same use cases should be possible to do in different ways, depending on the personas skills, behaviour patterns etc.
+A Persona description should consist of behavior patterns, goals, skills, attitudes, and also a description of environment of use. A realistic description brings the persona to life and opens different views to the designer: For example two different personas might approach the same problem from a different angle and probably they would use different ways of action to achieve the same goal. So the same use cases should be possible to do in different ways, depending on the personas skills, behaviour patterns etc.
 == Language Learning Personas ==