EduAbility: A Usability Evaluation of an Educational Recommendation and Training Tool for Pupils with Disabilities to Promote Inclusivity

This paper presents a usability evaluation of EduAbility, an Android application that supports inclusivity through assistive technology recommendations and training to pupils with disabilities, teachers, teaching assistants and parents/carers. EduAbility consists of a Recommendation System and Training Package that increases awareness of assistive technology (AT) to improve quality of life for individuals with disabilities. Following a previous usability evaluation at a higher education institution, EduAbility was subsequently developed from the qualitative feedback. A further evaluation at a secondary school and college (n = 9) are presented, where System Usability Scale (SUS) and NASA Task Load Index (TLX) quantitatively measure usability and workload, with Think Aloud providing qualitative data. The results highlight the significant potential of EduAbility to educate teachers, teaching assistants and parents/carers on AT, with the product recommendations being particularly valuable to increase awareness. Suggestions for future work are also discussed as well as the wider impacts of EduAbility on promoting the use of AT in education.