Pondr
Full business plan and personal project contributions
My Role
Graphic Designer
Project
Full Business Plan & Presentation
Date
Jan 2020 - Apr 2020
Project Goal
For this project, we were tasked with creating a digital platform that aims to improve education, based on one of the 17 United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals.
Process
This project was broken up into 3 Iterations in which we were able to perform several rounds of user testing, gather extensive research, and develop our project into its final deliverable.
Deliverables
Our final deliverables consisted of a low fidelity wireframe, a final high fidelity interactive prototype of the Pondr platform, a company website, and a full rationale report. To view these deliverables please follow the corresponding links below:
What is Pondr?
Pondr is a web platform that aims to improve the emotional intelligence of students and children with Autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Many children who are diagnosed with ASD struggle with emotional intelligence and Pondr aims to provide a platform that fosters emotional intelligence in the form of a non-intrusive, simple activity. Pondr's target audience is children ages 4 to 10 in Canada and the US that are diagnosed with Autism Spectrum Disorder.
Pondr's main components consist of the "Pondr Website", meant to serve as an informational source for parents to learn about the platform, and the Pondr platform itself. Both of these sites were designed with accessibility as the main driving force and many of my design decisions revolved around making Pondr as easy and accessible as possible.
Design Decisions
Through vigorous research, I identified that the most efficient colour scheme for our product would be a very muted palette consisting of shades of blue, green and yellow. It has been found that children with ASD find bright colours overwhelming and that they may trigger a sensory overload. Colours such as blue or yellow are typically seen as the best choice in ASD directed design.
Simple sans serif
font for ease
of understanding
Information boxed into digestible chunks of text
Muted colour scheme on a clean white background
Simple visuals
that don't crowd the page
Accessibility & Design
Because we are designing for children with ASD, many of our design decisions primarily focussed on accessibility. A few of the main considerations we made when designing our platform were:
1. Muted and calming colours foster a less chaotic environment.
2. Simple repetitive tasks help to create a routine that is easy to digest.
3. Simple language allows for increased understanding.
4. Every child on the spectrum has different needs, so a customizable experience is important.
To maximize accessibility, we made our platforms experience very customizable within the Parent's Platform section. Parents have the option of changing the platform's colours to greyscale, changing the font from a sans-serif font to a serif font, or adjusting audio settings for descriptive audio or dictation.
Takeaways
Throughout the evolution of Pondr, I learned so much about the importance of taking into consideration accessibility in design. Throughout this project, there were many design decisions myself and my group members may not have taken into account designing for ourselves. These considerations we may not have considered without our rigorous research and many rounds of user testing solidified the significance of knowing one's user in design, and the importance of UX and Graphic design going hand in hand.
Company Branding
Typography
Headings
Regular
Aa Bb Cc Dd Ee Ff Gg Hh Ii Jj Kk Ll Mm Nn Oo Pp Qq Rr Ss Tt Uu Vv Ww Xx Yy Zz
Body Copy
Bold | Regular
Aa Bb Cc Dd Ee Ff Gg Hh Ii Jj Kk Ll Mm Nn Oo Pp Qq Rr Ss Tt Uu Vv Ww Xx Yy Zz
Colour Scheme
#707070
#86A7A2
#BBC3AB
#E7CF9F
Logo Creation
Puzzle piece symbolism used for scalability
Simple black
colour scheme
Puzzle piece imagery representing the Autism community
Assets
Readable sans serif font and full capitalization
When designing the assets for Pondr we kept in mind that busy imagery and pages with tons of visual information could be distracting for children with ASD, and could make their experience difficult and frustrating. However, we also wanted to add an element of fun to the platform. To do this we chose 3 simple characters that would follow the child through their activities and act as a "friend" that was there to support them. Other than this character, the only imagery we included was a small base with hills and trees that mimicked the environment the character was in. This base remains stagnant throughout the child's use of the platform to not cause distraction.