Enhancing learning effectiveness by adopting a knowledge-based usability guidelines
VINE Journal of Information and Knowledge Management Systems
ISSN: 2059-5891
Article publication date: 8 February 2016
Abstract
Purpose
Guidelines for the design of knowledge-based e-learning usability systems are absent from the current recognized set of usability design heuristics and from an established evaluation methodology of e-learning system developments. Such systems can help Web designers and instructional designers design for different user needs and decide which properties are of a higher priority, thus meriting more design and development efforts. The authors aim to help students develop higher-order thinking skills, such as application, evaluation and syntheses of knowledge.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors applied Merrill ' s first principles of instruction and usability properties as pedagogical and usability design guidelines, knowledge management (KM) and hierarchical task analysis as methodological knowledge bases. The authors proposed a KM e-learning usability framework which frames our mapping of Web usability attributes to e-learning usability properties. The authors aim to investigate whether adopting Merrill ' s first principles of instruction and usability properties as knowledge-based guidelines/design factors would help learners develop higher-order thinking skills and whether this design would result in positive technology acceptance. The authors also developed a method matrix to map the selected methods of cognitive engineering to its potential uses in the KM e-learning usability framework of this paper and mapped e-learning usability tools with components in the KM e-learning usability system.
Findings
Findings indicated that our design effectively helped learners to demonstrate higher-order thinking skills and positive technology acceptance, promising indications toward the design and development of knowledge-based usability frameworks and systems.
Research/limitations/implications
The sample size of this paper is small. Hence, conclusions are not generalizable at this moment.
Originality/Value
The authors’ contributions are twofold: First, the authors proposed a KM e-learning usability framework, which frames the mapping of KM processes to e-learning principles and usability properties. Second, the authors proposed a method matrix which maps the selected methods of cognitive engineering to its potential uses in their KM e-learning usability framework. Based on these mappings and focusing on the usability properties navigation and learning support, the authors used ICT/Web2.0 tools to present/visualize information more clearly and more sensibly/manageably to students, to help trigger new knowledge and develop higher-order thinking skills, such as application, evaluation and syntheses of knowledge and articulate information from different perspectives throughout the KM life cycle.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
We would like to acknowledge and extend our heartfelt gratitude to the reviewers for their constructive feedback on our paper. This study was carried out while the third author was a Faculty at Multimedia University. The authors thank Multimedia University for its support to the first author, Dr. Chin, throughout her PhD study.
Citation
Chin, S.P.-P., Tsui, E. and Lee, C.-S. (2016), "Enhancing learning effectiveness by adopting a knowledge-based usability guidelines", VINE Journal of Information and Knowledge Management Systems, Vol. 46 No. 1, pp. 123-152. https://doi.org/10.1108/VJIKMS-02-2014-0015
Publisher
:Emerald Group Publishing Limited
Copyright © 2016, Emerald Group Publishing Limited