Technical Communication Quarterly Sep 2008 Open Access

The Practice of Usability: Teaching User Engagement Through Service-Learning

J. Blake Scott University of Central Florida

Abstract

Pedagogical and scholarly discussions of the process of usability tend to focus more on methods than on practices, or specific, tactical performances of and adjustments to these methods. Yet such practices shape students' learning and determine the success of their usability efforts. A teacher research study tracking students' understanding and enactment of usability and user-centered design over the course of a service-learning project illustrates the importance of practice-level struggles—and the thoughtful preparation for and facilitation of these struggles—to the development of students' flexible intelligence (metis) and rhetorical translation skills. © 2008 Taylor & Francis Group, LLC.

Journal
Technical Communication Quarterly
Published
2008-09-08
DOI
10.1080/10572250802324929
Open Access
OA PDF Green
Topics
service learning technical communication

Citation Context

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  1. Tham et al. (2020)
    Reading Born-Digital Scholarship: A Study of Webtext User Experience
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  3. Sánchez (2020)
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  5. Edenfield et al. (2019)
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  6. Acharya (2019)
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  7. Opel et al. (2018)
    Beyond Student as User: Rhetoric, Multimodality, and User-Centered Design
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  8. Rose et al. (2018)
    Poor poor dumb mouths, and bid them speak for me: Theorizing the use of persona…
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  9. Gonzales et al. (2017)
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  10. Sánchez (2017)
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  11. Chong (2016)
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  12. McNely et al. (2015)
    Contemporary Research Methodologies in Technical Communication
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  13. Pope-Ruark (2014)
    A Case for Metic Intelligence in Technical and Professional Communication Programs
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  14. Johnson (2010)
    The Ubiquity Paradox: Further Thinking on the Concept of User Centeredness
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Cites in this index (8)

  1. Coogan (2006)
    Service Learning and Social Change: The Case for Materialist Rhetoric
    College Composition and Communication
  2. Schneider (2005)
    Usable Pedagogies: Usability, Rhetoric, and Sociocultural Pedagogy in the Techn…
    Technical Communication Quarterly
  3. Spinuzzi (2005)
    Lost in the Translation: Shifting Claims in the Migration of a Research Technique
    Technical Communication Quarterly
  4. Sapp et al. (2002)
    A Laboratory in Citizenship: Service Learning in the Technical Communication Cl…
    Technical Communication Quarterly
  5. Salvo (2001)
    Ethics of Engagement: User-Centered Design and Rhetorical Methodology
    Technical Communication Quarterly
Show all 8 →
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    Technical Communication Quarterly
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Also cites 2 works outside this index ↓
  1. Mirel B. (2002)
    Reshaping technical communication: New directions and challenges for the twenty-first century
     ↗
  2. Spinuzzi C. (2003)
    Tracing genres through organizations: A sociocultural approach to information design
     ↗
CrossRef global citation count: 54 View in citation network →

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