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Purpose – Guidelines for the design of knowledge-based e-learning usability systems are absent from the current recognized set of usability design heuristics and from an established evaluation methodology of e-learning system developments. Such systems can help Web designers and instructional designers design for different user needs and decide which properties are of a higher priority, thus meriting more design and development efforts. The authors aim to help students develop higher-order thinking skills, such as application, evaluation and syntheses of knowledge. Design/methodology/approach – The authors applied Merrill ' s first principles of instruction and usability properties as pedagogical and usability design guidelines, knowledge management (KM) and hierarchical task analysis as methodological knowledge bases. The authors proposed a KM e-learning usability framework which frames our mapping of Web usability attributes to e-learning usability properties. The authors aim to investigate whether adopting Merrill ' s first principles of instruction and usability properties as knowledge-based guidelines/design factors would help learners develop higher-order thinking skills and whether this design would result in positive technology acceptance. The authors also developed a method matrix to map the selected methods of cognitive engineering to its potential uses in the KM e-learning usability framework of this paper and mapped e-learning usability tools with components in the KM e-learning usability system. Findings – Findings indicated that our design effectively helped learners to demonstrate higher-order thinking skills and positive technology acceptance, promising indications toward the design and development of knowledge-based usability frameworks and systems. Research/limitations/implications – The sample size of this paper is small. Hence, conclusions are not generalizable at this moment. Originality/Value – The authors’ contributions are twofold: First, the authors proposed a KM e-learning usability framework, which frames the mapping of KM processes to e-learning principles and usability properties. Second, the authors proposed a method matrix which maps the selected methods of cognitive engineering to its potential uses in their KM e-learning usability framework. Based on these mappings and focusing on the usability properties navigation and learning support, the authors used ICT/Web2.0 tools to present/visualize information more clearly and more sensibly/manageably to students, to help trigger new knowledge and develop higher-order thinking skills, such as application, evaluation and syntheses of knowledge and articulate information from different perspectives throughout the KM life cycle.