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Overally this course was very informative and fun! It's unfortunate that a lot of people seem to not take the course seriously, though. I came across many incomplete assignments in the peer review sections. I also wish my peers gave me actual feedback rather than just "good job" or "nicely done." I'm here to learn and improve and I don't feel like the community is helping me do that.

I also think it would be helpful if there was one main scenario that the practice assignments focused on rather than going back and forth between the different examples (CoffeeHouse, dog walker app, pizza app, etc.). I think seeing how the different steps play out in order in one scenario would give us a better idea of how the process works. I like having the other examples for some variety, but I think they'd be better if they were used as extra practice for those of us who want to try applying what we've learned in different situations before applying it to our portfolio piece.

Extremely useful information; unfortunately, the quizzes are poorly-made. It seems like the designers of this course didn't think about the questions they were writing nor the potential answers they offer to test-takers. The "correct" answers are frequently very similar to "incorrect" answers, or even contradictory to information told in the course. There is also no way to see why you got an answer wrong sometimes. The course simply says, "please review video X to learn why you got this answer wrong." First of all, sometimes the answer I submitted was consistent with what is written verbatim in the material. Second, if watching a video allegedly failed to teach me something, how would watching it again clarify anything? It's ironic this course emphasizes the need for UX designers to be empathetic, because the test designers don't seem to have taken this concept to heart. It's genuinely baffling how bad they are given the quality of the rest of the course.

The content is great! and the exercise and practice within the Project we chose at the beginning really gives you a real world feel for how a UX designer approaches design problems from a user perspective in several capacities. However, some of the quiz question options are not worded well, and in regards to the context provided in the learning, do not include part of the answer that are crucial to applying the learnings. Based on notes taken directly from the learnings, these multiple choice options are often worded in ways that have half the answer, but the other half is missing, or wrong, leading do difficulty in correctly answering the question. I've noticed this on a couple of occasions in the first course as well. While I am happy to admit when I've missed a question, I am disappointed to see that there was some thought missed in the way the multiple choice answers were worded, and ironically considering this is a UX class.

The selection of the project to be worked on takes place at a very early stage, where the learners are not yet aware of the next steps to be taken in this course in relation to the project, so they may choose an inappropriate project. This is a problem because not all Sharpen prompts are projects for which all the steps that are then required during the course can be completed. In addition, Sharpen's promts are not diverse enough, and the same promts are often repeated. I think that the projects in Sharpen should not be repeated, should always be different and there should be a Back button with which the user can go back to the prompts he has already seen. But above all, it should be explained briefly at least about everything that will be done in the course in connection with this project, so that the student can choose the right project.

Though I've been designing and developing interactive media for a long time, I wanted to see if I actually would qualify for the many UX-related positions I see out there. I do. Many of the concepts and processes taught in this course were rehashes of things we've always done in creating digital user environments – it's just that they are no codified and taught specifically in courses like this, and at Universities. I wasn't crazy about the peer review process, having used this in college-level courses I've taught in composition and communication, and find that it's simply a skillset that most people have developed (critiquing other people's work and providing constructive feedback). Overall, very good module.

I believe that the course itself is essential and helps students like me to develop UX skills. However, I think there should be smoother way in selecting portfolios. For example, there should only be like 3 portfolio selection and each portfolio can have an exemplar, so that we can validate if we are on a right track. Additionally, some portfolio will have a challenge on the competetive audits, just like mine, it's client management app, and I have to go over and see what competitors are there for me and mostly will need some payment to actually see the app. If we can do a simulation type of competitors for each of the portfolio selection, that will be really great. Thanks!

This course is very useful. Hands on experience is great. I have a suggestion about the assignment on week 5 of this course that grading may be broken down into more points. For example, Competitive Audit Report has 2 points of each items. In fact, some peers don't do well to get 2 but may get 1.5. As for Competitive Audit, there are total 2 scores for Rating those comparison items. In fact, some peers don't do even half or more than half a little bit. In summary, I think the task or question that need lots of work or input to be done may have score more than 2 to give chance for reflecting performance better.

Interesting introduction into starting to learn more on practical ways to empathize with users, through personas, user journeys, problem statement etc. However, the reading part of the course is where I particularly struggle with. I normally take double the time to read through the information. As I want to get the most of the course, I go through the additional articles that are optional. It would be good idea to mention how long the additional reading could take (mention on the approximate time in the vertical task toolbar).

The course content was useful but the last part peer reviews for imaginary competitors felt like a far-fetched idea. It took too long to get everything together and then peer reviews were a disappointment. The peers who are reviewing don’t bother to leave any comment/feedback Or they themselves do not have any idea about what is right or wrong. I felt the last assignment was very tedious and I would have benefited from a proper instructor review on this one.  Crazy8 exercize was fun and nicely explained.

Great course. I learned a lot of new things, although I have been designing on my own for a long time and studied to be a graphic designer. Really a lot of useful information. Thanks to the teacher and all those who made this course. Everything is clear and accessible. The only thing I really didn't like was that important course assignments are graded by peers who have no experience in UX design. I think that professionals should evaluate assignments so that it is objective.

Overall, the course is great. I like how deeply you dive into every section, getting detailed information. The only doubtful method for me is the peer-grading system. I am here to learn from the professionals in this field and although I understand what is the main point to learn works of other students, but on the other hand, it's extremely wrong that someone who has much lower knowledge than me at this point of the course, would grade my assignments and submissions.

The instructor was very easy to listen to and engaging, it's obvious she's a great asset to Google's Research Team! The only thing that was distracting in the videos is the monitor and back of the laptop. I would recommend positioning the instructors like you do with Shabi and others, so that they're the focus. She finally did use the monitor in 1 part of the course. Michaels' set up was the same, and I don't believe he used the monitor at all.

I wasn't really clear with what should I do ideation about. For example, if I still don't have an app, but just have an idea of making one, then should I do crazy 8 about 8 solutions that include an app, solutions we as ux dizajners have influence, or just solutions for problem users have with similar apps. I think in the end that I concluded it's the last. But It wasn't so clearly explained in the videos (at least for my opinion).

This course provides a lot of necessary protein in your entree. I found it however, to be slightly boring and dragging from all the Assignments. I still think it teaches a lot of core principles when approaching the early stages of a product/project when it comes to UX Design so, use this course wisely!

Lots of other readings can be found here and may be more helpful than just the course itself. Take advantage of this :)

This course has been a great experience for my UX journey. It has proven constructively difficult at times whilst offer entertaining and supportive guidance during times of ease. I do wish that the course elaborated on the Crazy 8's topic. For a commonly used skill set that is rather difficult to master due to inherent time restraints, I would have hope to see more exercises and interactive examples of the Crazy 8's.

Very interesting for someone coming to this field cold. A big step up from the first course, though -- I skated through that but put in hours of work in this course! Four stars because I wish there was some mechanism to interact with an instructor. Peer grading is useful most of the time, but I would love to get expert feedback now and then, and/or attend a live seminar and have the opportunity to post questions.

The course material is great, and it's setting me up to make a portfolio quite nicely! Unfortunately, the peer-reviewed assignments are not so great, since the rubric requirements are generally vague and peers don't tend to give in-depth feedback very often. The course layout is also changing up a bit right now as well, and I don't know if that's a consistent thing, but it's a bit disorienting.

+ Really fun and interesting practical activities.

+ Provided a great introduction on critical tools for empathising, defining and ideating.

- I feel I need clearer signs of when to update the case study slide deck.

- Completing two competitive audits + reports was quite overwhelming, especially when we have to download so many apps to compare against CoffeeHouse and our portfolio company.

This course was really good! It provided a solid foundation for the beginning of the Design Thinking Framework. The instructor and guest speakers were all personable and knowledgable. My only request is that there would be additional coverage on how to form a problem statement and more detail regarding the "Define" stage. Overall, definitely worth taking to understand the framework.

Slightly overlong feeling/tedious, though I came to believe it was on purpose. This section did require more in-depth exploration, and I enjoyed the assignments. I give 4 stars due to "Psychology" being an "optional" section, when I feel that in order to properly empathize equitably with users, UX Designers should have a more thorough understanding of the foundations of psychology.

Great course! Valuable information and practice in regards to Competitive Audit, but definitely takes more time than alotted and might be best suited for team work or broken down into smaller parts. Having to search for relevant websites also took some time. And honestly not sure how to answer some questions like, how do the competitors rate themselves (very subjective).

Course 2

This course was helpful. It does become a bit convoluted with the varying practice exercises instead of focusing in on our main project. Peer reviews to determine our grades are somewhat frustrating as we are all learning together and grades are given without feedback, which makes improving or changing our product difficult by having to guess what was wrong.