The lessons we take from failure can be fundamental to later success. Recount an incident or time when you experienced failure. How did it affect you, and what did you learn from the experience? (650 word limit - current 607)
Some of the greatest learning opportunities come from failures. One failure that I have gone through and learned from involved the launch of my webapp, StudyUp. StudyUp is a competitive studying site where users can play against their friends in a QuizUp style trivia match. The catch is that all of the questions are pulled from the user’s Quizlet flashcards. The site also contains tournament mode, where a teacher can create a tournament and have students battle through the bracket to determine who is the best. After hearing …show more content…
I published the website in several places, including ProductHunt, HackerBracket, Reddit, and several small teaching forums. According to Google Analytics, StudyUp received just over 1,000 unique visitors during its lifespan. Of these, over 46% did not make it further than the homepage. Looking back, one possible reason for this is that StudyUp did not explain itself well enough to the user. The interface, while not confusing, did not describe itself. To remedy this on my latest website, Peered, there is a video on the homepage that explains exactly how to use the site. Another reason StudyUp could not retain new users was due to the lack of initiative forced onto the user on the homepage. The user has the option to log in or they can jump into one of the provided categories, if they want. After StudyUp, all of my websites now make the user create an account or go through a tutorial before they are able to navigate the site freely.
However, there was one example of success for StudyUp. One of the English teachers at my school, who I introduced to StudyUp, integrated it into her curriculum. She had her students learn their Latin prefixes on Quizlet, and then used StudyUp to complement what they learned. The students enjoyed playing it in class and bragging when they beat one of their classmates. It encouraged students to study who would not normally, and their grades rose as a
Some of the greatest learning opportunities come from failures. One failure that I have gone through and learned from involved the launch of my webapp, StudyUp. StudyUp is a competitive studying site where users can play against their friends in a QuizUp style trivia match. The catch is that all of the questions are pulled from the user’s Quizlet flashcards. The site also contains tournament mode, where a teacher can create a tournament and have students battle through the bracket to determine who is the best. After hearing …show more content…
I published the website in several places, including ProductHunt, HackerBracket, Reddit, and several small teaching forums. According to Google Analytics, StudyUp received just over 1,000 unique visitors during its lifespan. Of these, over 46% did not make it further than the homepage. Looking back, one possible reason for this is that StudyUp did not explain itself well enough to the user. The interface, while not confusing, did not describe itself. To remedy this on my latest website, Peered, there is a video on the homepage that explains exactly how to use the site. Another reason StudyUp could not retain new users was due to the lack of initiative forced onto the user on the homepage. The user has the option to log in or they can jump into one of the provided categories, if they want. After StudyUp, all of my websites now make the user create an account or go through a tutorial before they are able to navigate the site freely.
However, there was one example of success for StudyUp. One of the English teachers at my school, who I introduced to StudyUp, integrated it into her curriculum. She had her students learn their Latin prefixes on Quizlet, and then used StudyUp to complement what they learned. The students enjoyed playing it in class and bragging when they beat one of their classmates. It encouraged students to study who would not normally, and their grades rose as a