Usability Testing

Panel Size

5 Participants

We tested Braillerunner with 5 people including: Two teachers of the visually impaired, one elementary school music teacher, and two fluent foreign language speakers.

Mode

20-40 minute usability tests

We tested the Tutorial, Lesson 1, and Braillerun task flows. Once refined, these same flows can be replicated for future lessons that tackle the full Braille alphabet, punctuation, and contractions.

Positive Impressions:

Visual Design & Aesthetic

All five users responded positively to the visual design. One praised the nostalgic vibes, noting it “looked like a modern phone game, but with old-school nostalgia.” Another described Chase as looking “like a Lego block,” which she found appealing. The 90s arcade aesthetic successfully resonated with the intended experience.

Intuitiveness & Usability

Four out of five users found the app intuitive. A user stated it was “totally usable, was intuitive to me.” Another described the core concept as “a really cool idea” and noted he was “having fun doing it.” The tutorial flow and game mechanics were generally clear without extensive explanation.

Broader Applications & Use Cases

Multiple testers identified valuable use cases beyond the original scope. Two users both suggested the app could serve people with progressive visual impairment who want to learn Braille while they still have vision. Another emphasized the app’s potential to engage sighted family members (parents, siblings, grandparents) and teachers in learning Braille, comparing it to the appeal of learning sign language.

Areas for Improvement:

Typing Feedback & Validation (Mentioned by 2 users)

Two users mentioned that instant feedback when typing was too quick or unclear. One noted, “maybe there’s some way to deliver feedback that makes correct answers that more obvious.”

Another also noted that the response time between typing letters could be shortened. He felt that, at that stage, he understood what he needed to do and was ready to type quickly.

Button Tactility & Visual Feedback

One suggested adding more tactile feedback to buttons: “when you click on 'tutorial,' it should change color or something” to provide clearer interaction confirmation. This could improve the sense of responsiveness throughout the interface.

Competitiveness & Rewards

One user strongly advocated for leaderboard and competitive play features, suggesting multiple competition types: time trials, furthest level reached, words per minute, and streak tracking (similar to Duolingo). She emphasized these features would “keep people engaged” and create motivation for repeat usage.

Another expressed interest in a rewards system (“little doodly dudes”) that would periodically award the user with coins, tokens, or pips of some kind. This would trigger an endorphin response, exciting the user and validating their efforts.

Summary & Recommendations for Iteration:

Enhance typing feedback clarity with more obvious visual indicators.

This is particularly necessary during the “success state” of typing actions, as users had a hard time confirming that what they had typed was correct. Add button press states (color change or animation) for improved tactility. This could be applied across the board - on both the home screen and within the typing experience - particularly during the tutorial.

Add / coin / pip reward system after each section

Implement a reward system so the user feels more appropriately rewarded for following prompts successfully.

Switch to a prototyping tool that supports multi-touch support.

This is a substantive change and will require a great deal of research and effort. After all other changes are made (and before developing additional modules), we should explore options other than Figma for the next iteration. Particularly for letters D and beyond (which contain three button presses at once), our prototyping tool needs to support this in order to create an authentic Braille keyboard experience.

Alternatively, we can explore single button support (so the user triggers multiple letters with successive instead of concurrent button presses), but it is unlikely that approach will yield a result that is tactually similar to a true Braille typing experience.

Some minor copy editing

A few users noted grammatical issues and phrasing that felt a little confusing, so we fixed that too.