Course Outline
This Usability Testing course is designed to teach participants the essentials of usability and how to effectively evaluate usability, user experience and accessibility. You will learn how to plan and prepare for usability testing and select the most appropriate testing location and participants. After understanding the application of usability reviews, testing and surveys you will be able to propose the most effective usability testing approach.
Business Outcomes
At the end of the training course the attendees will be able to perform the following:
- Understand the basic concepts of usability and usability testing.
- Identify and classify the severity of usability risks and potential accessibility violations in a given product at any stage of a development cycle.
- Cite relevant standards for usability, user experience, and accessibility and verify their implementation in a given product.
- Set up procedures so that stated usability, user experience and accessibility goals may be verified in practice for a given product.
- Design and monitor the implementation of a test plan for achieving stated usability, user experience and accessibility goals.
- Explain the rationale, process and results of usability, user experience and accessibility evaluations to non-specialist stakeholders.
Learning Objectives
The following learning objectives are covered in the training course:
Understand the concepts of usability, user experience and accessibility.
Understand the objectives of usability, user experience and accessibility evaluation.
Compare usability, user experience and accessibility evaluation.
Understand the three approaches to usability, user experience and accessibility evaluation: Usability review, usability testing and quantitative user surveys for satisfaction measurement.
Understand the differences between formative (qualitative) and summative (quantitative) usability evaluation.
Understand the key elements of human-centered evaluation.
Understand the human-centered design process.
Understand the usability evaluation approaches that work well in agile software development lifecycles.
Understand typical usability, user experience, and accessibility risks.
Analyze a given project at the design or evaluation stage, and identify the types of usability risks that are likely to occur.
Understand the general content and applicability of ISO usability standards and manufacturer guidelines to particular types of project/application.
Understand the general content and applicability of ISO 9241-171 (Software Accessibility) and the Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) 2.0 to particular types of project and applications.
Understand the general content of accessibility legislation (UK Equality Act 2010 and Americans with Disabilities Act).
Understand usability review as a method for evaluating usability, user experience and accessibility.
Understand the differences between informal usability review and expert usability review.
Analyze the usability aspects of a software application using the usability review method “heuristic evaluation” according to a checklist provided in the syllabus.
Understand the principal steps in the usability testing approach.
Understand the content of a usability test plan.
Understand the content of a usability test script.
Define a simple usability test task for a given project.
Understand considerations to be applied when deciding on a location for usability tests.
Understand the advantages and disadvantages of a usability test lab.
Understand the key activities in a usability test session.
Understand the procedure to apply for analyzing findings from a usability test.
Understand the classifications and ratings for usability findings.
Review a usability test report for a given project.
Understand how to overcome internal resistance to usability findings.
Apply a given list of best practices to report and communicate results.
Understand the quality control activities for a usability test.
Understand the most frequent and serious mistakes in usability testing.
Understand the purpose and approach adopted in user surveys.
Understand the principal content and objectives of the public user questionnaires SUS, SUMI and WAMMI.
Select appropriate method(s) for verifying and validating usability, user experience and accessibility in a given project.
Understand the principal tasks and responsibilities of the Usability Tester.
Understand the principal tasks and responsibilities of the Moderator and the Note-Taker.
Training Detail
he course runs for two days from about 08:00 until 17:00. Each day includes discussions on syllabus topics, practicing exam questions and exercises.
The course structure is aligned with the allocated time per chapter and sub-chapters as per the ISTQB Foundation Syllabus Usability Testing.
Introduction and orientation (20 minutes)
1. Basic Concepts (200 mins)
1.1 Fundamentals
1.1.1 Usability
1.1.2 User Experience Concepts
1.1.3 Accessibility
1.2 Evaluating Usability, User Experience and Accessibility
1.2.1 Usability Evaluation
1.2.2 User Experience Evaluation
1.2.3 Accessibility Evaluation
1.3 Usability Evaluation in Human-Centered Design
1.3.1 Usability Requirements
1.3.2 Agile Usability Evaluation
2. Risks in Usability, User Experience and Accessibility (80 mins)
2.1 Introduction
2.2 Typical Risks
2.2.1 Usability Risks
2.2.2 User Experience Risks
2.2.3 Accessibility Risks
2.2.4 Project Risks
3. Usability and Accessibility Standards (105 mins)
3.1 Usability Standards and Manufacturer Guidelines
3.1.1 ISO Usability Standards
3.1.2 Manufacturer Guidelines
3.2 Accessibility Standards
3.2.1 ISO Standards
3.2.2 The Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG)
3.2.3 Accessibility Legislation
4. Usability Reviews (90 mins)
4.1 Introduction and Approach
4.1.1 Step-By-Step Approach to Usability Reviews
4.1.2 Risks and Challenges
4.2 Types of Usability Review
4.2.1 Informal Usability Review
4.2.2 Expert Usability Review
4.2.3 Heuristic Evaluation
5. Usability Testing (270 mins)
5.1 Introduction
5.2 Step-By-Step Approach to Usability Testing
5.3 Prepare Usability Test
5.3.1 Usability Test Plan
5.3.2 Usability Test Script
5.3.3 Usability Test Tasks
5.3.4 Test Location
5.3.5 Usability Test Lab
5.3.6 Pilot Usability Test Session
5.4 Conduct Usability Test Sessions
5.5 Analysis of Findings
5.6 Communicate Results and Findings
5.6.1 Results
5.6.2 Usability Findings
5.6.3 Selling Findings to Stakeholders
5.6.4 Usability Test Report
5.6.5 Best Practices in Usability Test Reporting
5.7 Quality Control of a Usability Test
5.8 Challenges and Frequent Mistakes
6. User Surveys (30 mins)
6.1 Introduction
6.2 Step-By-Step Approach to User Surveys
6.3 Standardized Questionnaires
7. Selecting Appropriate Methods (40 mins)
7.1 Criteria for Selecting a Method
7.1.1 Selecting a Usability Evaluation Method
7.1.2 Selecting a User Experience Evaluation Method
7.1.3 Selecting an Accessibility Evaluation Method
8. Summary of Roles and Responsibilities (30 mins)
8.1 Usability Tester
8.2 Moderator and Note-Taker
Course Material
This course includes the following materials:
Name
Desciption
Course Outline
A general description of the course along with learning objectives, course materials and an outline of the course topics, including approximate timings for each section
Course Slides
A set of approximately 355 PowerPoint slides covering the topics to be addressed.
Foundation Study Pack
The foundation study pack includes the syllabus, glossary, 3 sets of sample questions and answers. A Foundation refresher will be done during the course.
Foundation Usability Testing Study Pack
The Foundation Usability Testing study pack includes the syllabus, glossary, sample questions and answers.
The printed course materials are provided in a binder in a way which makes it convenient for course attendees to remove portions as needed for reference, e.g., during exercises.