Information Architecture UX Course

Lesson 1 • Core Components of IA

Covers the four core systems: organisation, labelling, navigation, and search. Students connect each system to real user outcomes.

Lesson 2 • Mental Models and User Cognition

Explains how users form expectations about information spaces. Connects cognitive psychology principles directly to IA decision-making.

Lesson 3 • Defining Information Architecture

Establishes what IA is, its historical roots, and its scope within digital products. Grounds all subsequent techniques in a shared professional vocabulary.

Lesson 1 • Contextual Inquiry and Interviews

Gathers naturalistic data on how users seek and use information in real environments. Findings reveal unmet needs invisible in surveys.

Lesson 2 • Synthesising Research into IA Insights

Transforms raw research data into actionable structural recommendations. Bridges the gap between user data and design decisions.

Lesson 3 • Card Sorting Techniques

Teaches open, closed, and hybrid card sorting to reveal users' mental models. Results feed directly into category and label design.

Lesson 4 • Research Planning for IA Projects

Frames research goals around structural questions rather than usability alone. Teaches scoping, recruiting, and selecting appropriate methods.

Lesson 1 • Prioritising Content for Redesign

Applies business and user criteria to rank content for migration, revision, or removal. Produces a decision-ready content matrix.

Lesson 2 • Conducting the Content Audit

Evaluates content against quality, accuracy, and structural criteria. Audit findings expose redundancy, gaps, and misplaced content.

Lesson 3 • Content Modelling Basics

Introduces structured content models that separate content from presentation. Models enable consistent reuse across channels and devices.

Lesson 1 • Tagging and Folksonomy Systems

Contrasts controlled taxonomies with user-generated tagging and hybrid approaches. Students evaluate when folksonomies add value versus create noise.

Lesson 2 • Taxonomy Maintenance and Governance

Establishes processes for keeping taxonomies accurate as content evolves. Governance prevents vocabulary drift and structural decay over time.

Lesson 3 • Building Controlled Vocabularies

Teaches term selection, synonym management, and preferred-term rules. A controlled vocabulary ensures consistent labelling across the entire system.

Lesson 4 • Hierarchical Taxonomy Design

Constructs parent-child hierarchies that reflect user mental models and content relationships. Depth and breadth trade-offs are analysed with real examples.

Lesson 1 • Hierarchy and Flat Navigation Models

Compares hierarchical, hub-and-spoke, and flat navigation architectures. Trade-offs in depth, discoverability, and maintenance are examined.

Lesson 2 • Navigation System Types

Surveys global, local, contextual, and supplemental navigation patterns. Understanding each type enables appropriate selection for different content contexts.

Lesson 3 • Labelling Navigation Elements

Applies labelling principles to navigation links, headings, and calls to action. Clear labels reduce cognitive load and improve task completion rates.

Lesson 4 • Mobile and Responsive Navigation Patterns

Adapts navigation structures for small screens and touch interactions. Students evaluate hamburger menus, tab bars, and progressive disclosure patterns.

Lesson 1 • Faceted Search and Filtering

Designs faceted navigation that lets users narrow results by multiple attributes. Facet selection and ordering are tied directly to taxonomy design.

Lesson 2 • Search Interface Design

Covers search box placement, autocomplete, and results page layout. Interface decisions directly affect whether users trust and use the search system.

Lesson 3 • Search Relevance and Ranking

Introduces relevance tuning, boosting, and synonym handling for search engines. Students learn to collaborate with developers on relevance configuration.

Lesson 4 • Search Behaviour and Query Types

Analyses known-item, exploratory, and re-finding search behaviours. Understanding query intent drives every subsequent search design decision.

Lesson 1 • Version Control and Documentation Maintenance

Establishes practices for keeping IA documents current through project iterations. Outdated documentation causes costly misalignment between design and build.

Lesson 2 • Low-Fidelity Wireframing for IA

Creates structural wireframes that communicate layout and content priority without visual design. Wireframes at this stage test structure, not aesthetics.

Lesson 3 • IA Specification Documents

Produces written specifications that accompany visual deliverables. Specs prevent misinterpretation during development and serve as a project record.

Lesson 4 • User Flow and Task Flow Diagrams

Maps user paths through tasks to expose decision points and dead ends. Flows complement sitemaps by showing movement rather than static structure.

Lesson 1 • IA Roadmap and Iteration Planning

Translates evaluation findings into a prioritised, phased improvement roadmap. Roadmaps align IA work with product release cycles and resource constraints.

Lesson 2 • Aligning IA with Business Goals

Connects structural decisions to measurable business outcomes such as conversion and retention. IA strategy must be justified in business terms to gain organisational support.

Lesson 3 • Analytics-Driven IA Evaluation

Uses behavioural analytics to identify navigation failures and content gaps at scale. Quantitative data complements qualitative testing for a complete picture.

Lesson 4 • Usability Testing for IA

Designs moderated and unmoderated tests focused on navigation and findability tasks. Test results provide evidence for structural changes and stakeholder buy-in.