Role: UX/UI Designer and Print Designer
Team: UX Designer, User Researcher, Product Manager, Curriculum Manager, Engineering, Stakeholders
Platform: Web (Planning) + Print (Instruction)
Overview
Building on the philosophy of productive struggle and self-discovery, InsightMath is a new interactive classroom curriculum designed for today’s classrooms.
For the launch, we created a Teacher Guide in digital and print formats to provide a consistent, easy-to-use experience that supports lesson planning and online teaching.
Understanding the Landscape
We started with a competitive analysis of how other education brands handle teacher materials and found a few key gaps in the market:
- Digital lesson-planning tools were often overwhelming.
- Not enough guidance for facilitating teacher lessons.
- Print and digital materials didn’t work well together.
Early teacher interviews confirmed this: they liked digital guides for planning but relied on print during class lessons.
Proof of Concept
Working closely with R&D, we built an early digital prototype using ST Math’s existing console styles. As the concept evolved, we focused on a few key areas:
- Collaborated with stakeholders early on to define business requirements
- Established the initial Lesson Outline architecture, which became a central space for planning and launching classroom lessons
- Explored additional concepts for interactive classroom experiences to illustrate what a lesson could look like for both students and teachers
- Used the prototype to build business buy-in and as a starting point for uncovering user needs
Early Discovery & Design
We continued collaborating with research, PM, curriculum designers, and engineering to iterate on design:
- Expanded the information architecture to organize content from Unit → Investigation → Cluster → Lesson
- Added tabs, collapsible sections, and sub-navigation to simplify complex content structures
- Enabled progressive disclosure so teachers could focus on key content without cognitive overload
- Collaborated with stakeholders to help define the core product requirements to guide future design
Digital Teacher Guide
The digital experience focused on lesson planning, with designs supporting both scannability and depth. Key UX/UI choices included:
- Progressive disclosure so teachers could focus on what mattered without cognitive overload
- Mobile responsiveness for all device types
- Tabbed navigation for quick access to content levels
- Clear, consistent headers and layout structure
- Subtle visual hierarchy using collapsible content blocks
- Simplified, accessible components drawn from our evolving UI style library
We made regular refinements based on teacher feedback and usability input, streamlining content and removing friction. Also, taking into account business needs and engineering feasibility.
Final Prototype
Page Interactions
Responsiveness
Printed Teacher Guide
As digital designs matured, we began mirroring the structure in print. However, based on usage patterns:
- We intentionally omitted certain planning elements from the print version, streamlining it for real-time teaching
- Consistency remained critical—visual language, terminology, and content flow were aligned with the digital product
- Print and digital began informing each other, leading to a refined and unified experience across platforms
UI Library & Design System
To support long-term scalability, I led the development of a new UI library and design system tailored to InsightMath’s evolving brand. This included:
- A consistent visual system for both web and print
- Reusable, accessible UI components for future product work
- Visual patterns designed to bridge instructional contexts—so teachers felt at home in either medium
- Enabled smoother handoff and faster development through the use of pre-defined components
Results & Takeaways
- Teachers responded positively to the simplified digital planning experience
- The visual and structural consistency reduced onboarding friction across formats
- Our approach laid the foundation for a modular, extensible design system used in future product lines
Reflection
This project reinforced the value of platform-aware design thinking—not just making things consistent, but understanding user intent across contexts. It also deepened my collaboration with curriculum experts and strengthened my hybrid skills in both UI/UX design and print systems.