Giving teachers back their time
Learning Lens uses AI to automatically synthesize student data, giving teachers real-time visibility into every student's progress during Project Based Learning.
Project Length
3 weeks, asynchronous
Project Type
Web app
Team Size
1 designer, 3 engineers, 3 business & presentation (7 total)
My Role
Product Designer · Design QA & Dev Collaboration
Recognition
Honorable mention, top 6 out of 13 teams, judge panel
A note on this project
As the sole product designer on this project, my focus was on the user flow, wireframes, and design QA. The UI screens were AI-generated by the engineering team. My role was ensuring the design intent and user experience held through to the final build.
Problem
Why are teachers not implementing PBL?
Most teachers abandon PBL entirely, not because they don't believe in it, but because the data overwhelms them.
In PBL, every student tackles challenges differently, generating a flood of data no teacher can realistically track alone. Without a way to synthesize it quickly, giving each student tailored feedback becomes impossible.
What is PBL?
Project Based Learning (PBL) is a teaching method where students tackle real, complex challenges over an extended period, rather than following a single structured lesson plan.
Solution
How does Learning Lens give teachers back their time?
Learning Lens uses AI to automatically synthesize student work, giving teachers real-time visibility without extra effort.
👑 Top 6
of 13 teams · Honorable mention · Judge panel
Real-Time learning visibility
Track progress across all project stages
AI-powered work analysis
Automatically reviews artifacts and reflections to identify skill growth
Teacher dashboard & alerts
See who's progressing, who needs help, and where to intervene
Student Evidence Gallery
Student Alerts on Teacher Dashboard
Learning Lens was built to provide teachers a tool that do it all.
Here's how we brought it to life.
Discovery
What were teachers missing from their existing tools?
Teachers and students lack a shared, structured way to make progress, goals, and learning needs visible throughout PBL.
Most of our team members have a background in education. Drawing on that experience and our knowledge of existing edtech tools, we found that these products span across three categories: AI assistants, project management, and portfolio management. While each category has strong solutions, none offered teachers a one-stop experience that brings all three together.
Existing tools & Gaps
AI ASSISTANT
Magic School, Flint
AI capabilities not applied to PBL student work specifically
Project Management
Google Classroom, Canvas, Schoology, Trello, Asana, Miro
Helps organize tasks but can't tell teachers who needs help right now
Portfolio Management
Seesaw, Peergrade, Bulb
Captures student work retrospectively but lacks real-time tracking
Defining focus
What did the data tell us to build first?
Our vote confirmed: solve for what happens after the lesson starts, not before.
That became our north star.
We generated How Might We statements based on our research, then voted as a team to prioritize which problem to solve first. The vote aligned us around one key insight:
Teachers aren't struggling with planning, they're experienced at that
The breakdown happens mid-project, when student data becomes impossible to track manually
Teacher planning was deliberately scoped out as a future opportunity.
Voting on our How Might We statements to find our north star
Teachers shouldn't have to chase data.
We simplified the workflow so the data comes to them.
user flow
Designing for two users at once
Teachers shouldn't have to chase data.
We designed the flow so student work is automatically analyzed by AI against the rubric, and the results surface to the teacher in real time.
View full user flow
Student and teacher flows showing how every student action triggers a teacher response.
Wireframes & Design QA
How the designs took shape
I started with wireframes, reviewed the build, and worked with the engineer to get it right.
wireframes
Mid-fi screens mapping the student milestone flow and 4 checkpoint states
DESIGN QA
Annotated screens to flag missing states, interaction gaps, and priority fixes.
final prototype
Learning Lens in action
Learning Lens gives teachers back their time by synthesizing student data in real-time, providing visibility into every student's learning progress throughout the PBL process.
Al analyzing student evidence against tre rubric
Student milestone view with 4 checkpoint states
Teacher dashboard: support alerts and skill snapshot
The project ended.
The learning didn't.
Reflection
What would I do differently?
The lesson: the scope was right, but it wasn't communicated clearly enough to the judges.
We validated with the team, not the users.
Due to our 3-week timeline, we were only able to leverage the background of our team members to validate our assumptions about what teachers struggle with most during their PBL journey. Given more time, talking to active teachers outside our team would have been the first thing I'd prioritize.
The scope was right. The presentation wasn't.
The judges suggested showcasing the teacher planning experience would have strengthened our presentation. Our scoping was intentional: teachers come in with their lessons planned, and our job was to solve what happens after. But we didn't communicate that assumption clearly enough to the panel. That's a presentation gap I'd be more deliberate about next time.
The UI wasn't fully flushed out in time.
The teacher dashboard was included in the final demo but the student status indicators weren't fully fleshed out. That would be the first thing I'd prioritize in the next iteration, along with building out the teacher planning feature as the natural next step for Learning Lens.