Lang Stream
An immersive live-stream learning platform
LangStream was a 2-month UX design project developed for the course Applied User Experience Design (Fall 2024). Our goal was to explore how live-streaming could improve the experience of online language education for both learners and instructors.
Bridging learners and instructors through real-time, interactive language education. From spontaneous speaking practice to live feedback and analytics, LangStream supports both sides of the learning experience, making online education more personal, responsive, and effective.
My Role
UX Designer
UX Researcher
Team
Elaine Wang
Lia Cociorva
30 Sec Insight
While this was a collaborative project, I led the early research framing, defined the information architecture, and designed the end-to-end UX flow and high-fidelity interfaces for the learner side.
All designs and interactions shown on this page are part of my independent work.
Research Framing
Live-streaming is rapidly changing how people connect, watch, and participate—could it also transform how they learn? This trend made us curious about its potential in education, especially language learning, where real-time interaction, community, and motivation are critical.
🟧 What existing platforms offer—and what they trade off
We scanned popular streaming platforms before user research.
Yet most language learning platforms are still built around static, one-way content that doesn’t reflect how people are actually learning today.
🟧 Learners are ahead of the platforms
According to Forbes (2023):
🟧 This behavioral shift revealed a gap between what users do and what products offer.
So we set out to understand:
who are today’s language learners and instructors, on both sides of the classroom, and what do they actually need?
We didn’t start with a fixed solution—we started with people.
And we built our research around both sides of the classroom from the very beginning.
Primary Research
🟧 How we aligned as a team
Before any interviews, we created a shared research guide to align our goals and ensure we were asking the right questions.
From there, we clarified three research focuses for both learners and instructors:
What motivates them to engage with online language learning?
What tools and formats do they currently use—and where do they feel friction?
What do they expect from a better learning or teaching experience?
🟧 Two users, two paths
We interviewed 7 people: 4 language learners and 3 instructors, to understand how they use existing tools and what challenges they face.
This dual-track research allowed us to compare needs across both roles and identify key themes that appeared repeatedly.
Research Insight
To synthesize what we learned, our team color-coded every quote by user role and clustered similar observations.
This helped us identify shared patterns and role-specific needs—especially around clarity, structure, and feedback. These insights formed the foundation for our design direction.
Both learners and instructors emphasized the need for clarity, structure, and interaction—but their definitions differed.
Learners wanted more guidance, timely feedback, and a sense of progress.
Instructors needed better visibility, scalable class tools, and engagement insights.
From Insight to Design Focus
To turn research insights into actionable directions, we reframed the key challenges as a set of “How Might We” questions—one set for learners, one for instructors.
How might we:
...help learners feel more guided and less overwhelmed during online learning?
...provide real-time feedback to support learners' confidence and motivation?
...design structured yet flexible learning flows that adapt to individual goals?
...make live language learning more engaging than passive video watching?
..support instructors in managing live classes efficiently at scale?
...help instructors track student participation in real time during sessions?
...make it easier for instructors to build their visibility and reach learners?
...reduce the friction of preparing and delivering structured online lessons?
Concept Ideation
🟧 From Problems to Possibilities
Based on the themes from our research and HMW framing, we brainstormed potential solutions across both learner and instructor needs. We sorted these ideas into clusters: navigation, engagement, interaction tools, and more.
🟧 Making Tradeoffs Visible
To align our focus as a team, we evaluated each idea using a 2x2 matrix—balancing priority and feasibility. This helped us determine which features to pursue first, and which to keep in mind for future iterations.
🟧 Mapping Out the Platform Structure
To bring our design vision together, we organized our top-priority features into a sitemap that reflects the full structure of Langstream.
This helped us visualize how users—both learners and instructors—would navigate through the platform, from discovery to interaction, and from watching to community building.
WIreframe & User Flow
After defining the core structure of Langstream, we mapped out key user flows to support real-world tasks across both learner and instructor roles.
This helped us visualize interaction logic before jumping into wireframes.
for learners:
for instructors:
Language onboarding: Select learning goals, levels, styles
Personalized setting: Tailor content and notification preferences
Live session engagement: Interact via comments and emojis
Follow & subscribe to future lessons
Add streaming profile to account
Fill in teaching experience, bio, background
Apply to become a verified instructor
live streaming settings
Wireframe
With the key flows outlined, we moved on to sketching wireframes—bringing the structure and interactions into visual form.
Final Design Deliverable
Accessibility Design
We focused on Accessibility Design to ensure the product is inclusive and usable for a broader range of users. We prioritized color contrast to meet WCAG (Web Content Accessibility Guidelines) standards, ensuring text readability for users with visual impairments.
🟧 Explore & Stream Access
On the homepage, users can freely explore recommended lessons and ongoing live streams.
Paid and free content is clearly distinguished to support learning preferences and monetization logic.
🟧 In-Session Syllabus & Group Interaction
During live sessions, learners follow structured syllabi while joining chat-based discussion groups.
🟧 Comment & Emoji Interaction
Low-barrier tools like quick emoji and comment input allow students to participate without pressure.
🟧 Full-Screen Viewing Mode
A clean, distraction-free view to help learners focus on core content.
🟧 Instructor’s Live Setup Panel
Verified instructors can prepare stream content and set session metadata.
