Go Relate
Project Relate is a recently released Android beta app from Google Research for automatic speech recognition of non-standard speech. The app aims to help communication for people with non-standard speech in daily life. Given the awareness of the app is low within the clinical and target user population, with the limited onboarding training of the app, designing training on the use of Project Relate is the goal of this project.
Go Relate is the online training designed for speech and language therapists (SLTs) to help learning and adoption of Project Relate for their clients in everyday life. The design involved thorough user research with specialists inclusing co-design with SLTs to create the user-centred training for them. The training is currently developed to incorperate into the AT innovation portal at GDI Hub.
Scope
Problem framing
Concept development
Design implementation
My Role
User research
UI design
Usability test
Implementation
Duration
04/2023 - 10/2023
Background information
What is AT?
It stands for assistive technology, which is an umbrella term for assistive products and their related services that are essential to the distribution and utilisation of assistive products.
What is Project Relate?
It is a personalised speech recognition APP recently introduced by Google. It enables individuals with non-standard speech to train speech recognition models specifically on their own speech patterns.
Why speech and language therapists (SLTs)?
They play an essential role in increasing awareness of assistive technologies and providing clients with training and support key to maximising impact and promoting successful integration in daily life.
The challenge
There is a lack of AT usage.
No more than 40% of people consistently used the AT for more than one year due to the drawbacks of traditional AT.
Project Relate is losing public awareness
Its global download keeps dropping after reach a peak of 6k downloads in the first launching month.
SLTs report a lack of professional AT training
Only 25% of SLTs believed in themselves to have the competence to provide AT services after training.
The Goal
Design the training material for SLTs to learn comprehensive knowledge of Project Relate and know how to introduce Project Relate to their clients
Outcome
An online interactive training course for SLTs to learn about Project Relate.
The design has been integrated into the AT Innovation Portal with GDI Hub.
Design Method
Background & User Research
Functions of Project Relate
There are five functions of the app: Record, Listen, Repeat, Assistant and Keyboard.
People need to record 500 phrases before accessing other functions.
Listen: real-time transcription for the speech of users.
Repeat: restates short phrases by users and also help them interact with virtual assistants.
Assistant: allows users to control Google Assistant on their phone.
Keyboard: speech-to-text by Project Relate in any other app with a keyboard.
Limitations of Project Relate website
01/
It highlights benefits and weaken the drawbacks of the app;
02/
It does not emphasise Custom card and Relate Keyboard functions;
03/
It has only one-sided complimentary wording.
Current training methods
By three observations on the current avaiable Proejct Relate training for healthcare professionals, both important information and drawbacks of the training were discovered and shown in the journey map below.
User feedback on current training
Key findings from the survey
01/
SLTs prefer face-to-face training, online meeting and interactive instructions, rather than joint sessions with clients.
02/
SLTs expect adding case studies showing how Relate can be used in real world.
03/
Custom card, Assistant and Keyboard are thought as useful functions to clients by SLTs
04/
SLTs further want a quick start guide to deliver Relate to their clients.
Result analysis
Co-design: Insights from SLTs
A co-design workshop was conducted with three SLTs and one Project Relate specialist who are also the trainer to discuss the pros and cons of the current training and come up with ideas for their expected training methods.
Key findings
Related to the app
Pros
Cons
Key findings
Related to the training
Pros
01/
Well introduced Custom Card
02/
Delivered with lots of patience
03/
A phone with fully-functioned Relate to demonstrate
Cons
01/
Not show what Relate can do until the end
02/
Not suggest SLTs to train Relate before the session with clients
03/
Technology focused making client think it is hard to use
04/
Not assess the suitability of the client before introduction
05/
No video examples of its real users demonstrating it
06/
No accessibility consideration for clients (visual)
Possible training method analysis
Several concepts were ideated based on the co-design workshop. According to the design points concluded above, the evaluation dimensions are summarised into scope of influence, information capacity usability,and labour input from trainers. Interactive webpage was selected as the training method.
Prototype and iterations
Low-fidelity protoypes were created based on reseaerch result. User testing was carried out with three designers and three SLTs to receive feedback and support iterations. The feedback from designers were mainly on the logic of user flow while SLTs mainly provided suggestions for content design.
Solution
Functions Explanation
The interactive course consists of Homepage, Suitability Checklist, Function Training, Custom Card Generator and Tool Kits.
01/Homepage
Show Pros & Cons
From user research, people want to know the comprehensive fact about Project Relate to decide whether they want to use it.
02/Suitability Checklist
Assess suitability in advance
The checklist help SLTs assess whether their clients are suitable to use Project Relate before the learning. It also explains the reasons for each requirement.
Suitability Checklist
They communicate in English in everyday life.
Project Relate can now only understand English. Note they are only American English.
There are three different results according to the situation chosen in the checklist.
03/Function training
Use scenarios
The training explains functions including Record, Custom Card, Listen, Repeat, Assistant and Keyboard. It introduces the interfaces and possible use scenarios of each function.
04/Assessment
Enhance the knwoledge
After the training, a simple assessment will take place to help enhance the knowledge learned before.
06-1/Tool Kits
Training tips for SLTs
This is an optional section for SLTs to know tips about effective ways to deliver Project Relate to their clients. These tips were concluded from co-design workshop with SLTs.
06-2/Tool Kits
Feedback forum
In this part, learners can upload their experience of using Project Relate, meeting the SLTs' needs of seeing real user feedback
Tranformation into live website
After submitting my dissertation, I started to tranform my design into a website by WIX. Due to the limitation of the website builder and several user tests, the final outcome went through a series of changes.