instructional design--unpacked

In the final days of this Fall 2009 semester, I returned to the course syllabus and realized that through this personal blog outlet, we were supposed to examine some questions that pertained to this subject matter: "What is technology? What does an 'instructional designer' do? How would you explain to your friends, work associates, or mother-in-law what it is that you are learning and what you will be able to do with your future degree?" I thought I'd utilize these extremely relevant questions as a framework to structure (what I believe will be) my final post related to this course.

What is technology? And I might add: How is it massaged into instructional design?

In our first day of this course, when asked what first comes to my mind when I think of technology, I wrote "computer" in my notebook. I now know that response to actually be rather narrow. Instead, technology is any tool that aids in the successful achievement of the instructional objectives. While a computer (hardware) and its related programs (software) may in fact represent a form of technology, it is just that--one form--and not an all-encompassing definition of the term. Flash cards, paper/pens, whiteboard/dry-erase markers, overhead transparencies, etc. all constitute various tools that an instructional designer may choose to utilize. Given this newfound denotation, it seems evident that instructional designers rely heavily on technology to satisfy the three paramount values: efficiency, effectiveness, and appeal. Of course, one could always design content that includes only lecture and/or discussion, but these values--in my opinion--are what inevitably link instructional design to technology. As a designer, you want to generate a product that is concise (i.e., efficient), competent (i.e., effective), and can captivate (i.e., appeal). Technology can facilitate and encourage these feats. But I contend that the designer must carefully consider which technology(ies) best suits his/her instructional project, as the temptation to automatically incorporate computer-aided instruction may prove unreliable or even detrimental to the overarching objectives.

What does an "instructional designer" do? How would you explain to your friends, work associates, or mother-in-law what it is that you are learning and what you will be able to do with your future degree?

In my handwritten notes on Sept. 29, I wrote that an instructional designer serves as a bridge between learning theory and teaching praxis. I might expand that to suggest that an instructional designer is a theorist, pragmatist, marketer, and a consultant all in one package! The ADDIE model necessitates the merger of these seemingly independent roles.

When in the Analysis stage, the designer becomes a theorist and considers the theoretical elements and descriptive actions of the instructional project: What will the participants learn? Why do they need to learn it? Where will they learn it? How will they know that they have learned it? Part of this contemplation involves a discussion about learning theory and which one(s) likely inform the resultant materials. For instance, a need that requires a mental, organizational component may contain some instruction that focuses on schema, or connection to prior knowledge. A need that asks the participant to create meaning or personalize the material may offer some hands-on activities that allow for experimentation and/or application. In the end, before he/she can determine the best pedagogical strategies to employ, the designer must first understand various learning theories and how they predict learning occurs in an individual.

Once in Design and Development of the instructional project, the designer transitions into a more pragmatic role. Who is our target audience? What makes these learning goals feasible? What technology(ies) can facilitate the broader objectives? How will instruction promote learning and achievement? At this point, the designer must ponder the precise pedagogical processes and protocols practiced in order to produce a product that parallels the primary values.

The instructional-designer-as-marketer "hat" emerges in Implementation. Here, he/she should understand the basic factors that influence adoption that Ev Rogers articulated: relative advantage, compatibility, complexity, trialability, and observability. For relative advantage, how does this product benefit the recipient (e.g., the instructor) or participants? In other words, why should the target audience want this product? For compatibility, how does this product conform to the target audience's lifestyle? For complexity, how difficult is it for the target audience to use/understand the product? For trialability, can the target audience experiment with the product before it actually adopts it? And for observability, how will others likely perceive the target audience for adoption of this product? At this stage in the ADDIE model, it seems to me that the instructional designer needs to be able to "sell" his/her product to the target audience he/she theoretically developed it for in the first place.

Finally, the instructional designer morphs into a consultant once he/she enters the Evaluation phase. Now it's time to be somewhat critical (or allow somebody else to be) of the initial product. What are the strengths of this product? Where can it be improved? How? With all of these roles that comprise the existence of an instructional designer, it becomes apparent to me that he/she must possess a patient attitude and mindset palatable to numerous ideas and suggestions.

And this is easier said than done. I'm much more accustomed to my own lesson plans, which is really just instructional design for myself, and that's much easier b/c I already know what I'm willing to try and what I'd rather avoid, and I have a pretty decent idea of what will and won't work with my students. That background knowledge/understanding really expedites the ADDIE model for my own teaching. But what we did in this course--an instructional design project for somebody else--requires much more consideration of potential circumstances and participants, mainly b/c you may not already know what or who they are! Indeed, it's been quite an illuminating experience for me.

blog reflexivity statement

For this post, I thought I'd take advantage of the opportunity to augment my 6430 blog from this semester before I generate my final, conclusive comments toward the course and instructional design in general. I need to identify whose blog(s) I've enjoyed the most, who's provided me with the most comments and/or feedback in my blog, and my personal evaluation of my own blog on a scale of one to 10.

Let me begin with the admission that I loved the idea of a personal blog at the start of the semester! While I've read many blogs prior to the creation of my own, I'd never before taken initiative to maintain a digital record of my thoughts and opinions, and this course afforded me (if not coerced!) the chance to explore that uncharted territory. Which is so contrary to my personality! When I teach, for instance, I usually take copious notes that acknowledge what flied and flopped in my class. I'll also note--when time permits--my reaction(s) to certain pedagogical endeavors. I know that I'll need and benefit from this information when I reach that point again in a subsequent semester, so I try to diligently make handwritten notes whenever possible.

That said, I'm not quite sure why my passion for and interest in my own blog dissipated as the semester progressed, although I have my suspicions. One need only look at it to discern that my voice hasn't made the transition into electronic dialogue for almost two months! However, that harrowing and embarrassing fact shouldn't indicate that I had nothing to say; indeed, it's quite the contrary. I think that, in short, I resorted to my "old" habit of writing my thoughts and sentiments in my course notebook, and I just never took (or made) the time to transfer them to my blog.

I believe this happened for a couple reasons: shifting priorities, overwhelming conversation mandates, and preferring simplicity.

You'll notice that I made an admirable attempt to publish substantive posts through our fall break, and that's when the bottom sort of fell out. Of course, this brings into question the debate over quantity versus quality, and I'd like to believe that I made some thought-provoking, insightful statements in my intitial posts. Indeed, as I reread them, I was pleased with the content and structure presented. But by October, with the semester in full motion, I had two academic conference presentations for which to prepare within a one-month duration. And I suspect that the traveling, lodging, and presenting obligations associated with both of these professional development opportunities led me to push this personal blog to the "back burner," and in consideration of my handwritten notes made in my course notebook, I think I probably felt satisfied with my internal struggle/comprehension of course materials and the documentation of it. Unfortunately, I failed to bring this personal blog off of the "back burner" and front and center as we neared the conclusion of the fall semester.

However, if I can be critical of the curricular requirements for a moment, then I'd like to admit that I felt overwhelmed by the number of conversations that occurred at once in this course. I found it especially challenging, as I already noted, to just maintain my own blog let alone comment on those kept by my colleagues. Moreover, we also needed to contribute to discussions had on WebCT. Personally, I found all of this dialogue to be a bit overkill, and if I may be so bold, might I suggest that students either do one or the other in the future: WebCT or personal blogs? That may allow for better maintenance records and a higher volume of comments.

I only received three comments from my peers--each from a different person (Carter, Ashley, and Christi). To be fair, I didn't exactly provide them with much material in the first place, but I think this exiguous number might support my previous point. And I noticed scant comments on other blogs as well, although I didn't follow some as regularly as others. I tended to gravitate more often to Angela's and Christi's blogs, most likely because they existed through WebCT, which I needed to visit anyway in order to download e-reserve texts and participate in online discussions/debates. Angela offered chapter summaries and her personal commentaries toward the material on her blog, which I found very useful, especially when I had limited time to thoroughly read the chapter on my own. And Christi's brutal honesty resonated with me, if only because she often said overtly what I felt internally. I remember certain posts that began with, "My head's going to explode!" and "I have such a headache!" I really appreciated her willingness to share her vulnerability from time to time; graduate students don't often want to admit to such a feeling let alone declare it publicly.

Finally, the third reason why I believe my blog evolved the way it did relates to my personal preference for simplicity. Here we are--about to enter the second decade of the 21st century--and I still view the computer as a more formal communicative vehicle than I probably should. In my handwritten notebook, I just jot down my primitive thoughts without much regard for lines, grammar, spelling, formatting, spacing, etc. On the other hand, when I sit at the computer and try to do the same thing, I feel compelled--why I don't know--to "clean it up" and pay more attention to the presentation of my content than just the substance behind it. This is a personal attribute that I should certainly explore down the line if only because it's so contradictory to what I know to be true. As I said, I enjoy journaling and writing; in fact, I've devoted my entire scholarly career to the communication discipline! Oh, the irony of my life!

So there is my qualitative assessment of my blog. And, just to reiterate some finer details that I need to articulate: blogs I've enjoyed the most: Angela and Christi; and only three comments from others in my blog: Carter, Ashley, and Christi. Now for the final quantitative note: I'd give my blog a 7-8 out of 10 because while I feel disappointed in my lack of sustained posts through the second half of the semester, I know that I made personal comments/questions/acknowledgments in my handwritten notebook, and even though those may not have made it into a formal, typed blog, they nevertheless served a similar purpose.

Help vs. Hinder: Technology and Our Students

I teach postsecondary courses in journalism and mass communication. At 26, I feel like I'm in a unique position where I'm able to relate more to my students now than perhaps in another decade or two. And yet, in spite of the generational comradery, I sometimes think I'm "further away" than even I realize.

I recently gave my students an assignment--a research-intensive task that required attribution to credible studies--only to have one of my students ask for basic catalog assistance because they "had never had to go to the library." Of course, I offered some help, but I simultaneously wondered, "How is this possible? How can a senior about to graduate with a college degree have never entered the on-campus library?"

To be fair, they probably had entered the library throughout their undergraduate tenure, at least through the online services available to students; in fact, to my knowledge, card catalogs don't exist anymore, or at least only in select locations (where they're usually on display for archival/nostalgic reasons!). I know our campus library doesn't have one. And as a graduate student, I have frequently used the online services and databases available to me to locate literature and other resources necessary to complete my assignments.

But, as I inquired further as to how this student could have avoided any physical contact with our library, they replied that most of their research came from Internet sources.

Such a reply made me wonder: Do we help our students understand how technology potentially helps but also hinders them?

I didn't continue my inquiry, but I wondered if this student had--at least until this point--made it through their collegiate career without comprehension of how technology used in that way--i.e., to collect sources for research projects--can contribute to their success but can also damage the quality of their work? Did this student know how to verify credibility in the Internet sources they used?

In a different storyline that produced similar questions, I had just described my interpretation of the journalistic writing process to students in my introductory news reporting course, and I discovered that when it came to proofreading their work, the students--if they did it at all--typically just read through their entire story once. And only once. Trying to check for everything: an effective lead (or start to the story), strong verbiage, proper attribution to their human and literary sources, correct grammar and comma usage, appropriate AP Style technique, and avoidance of redundancy, echo quotes, unnecessary opinions, and factual errors.

My mind can't focus on all of those aspects at once, and I've been practicing my journalism craft for several years! So how could an introductory student do it?

Well, as it pertains to spelling and grammar, that's apparently Microsoft Word's responsibility. And strong verbiage? That comes from the readability statistics that appear after Word checks the document for spelling and grammatical errors. (Students can view the percentage of passive sentences in their text.) In the end, my students didn't know how to effectively proofread their stories. Perhaps that results from an over-reliance on technology to do it for them?

Anecdotes aside, the point of this blog post is to stress the importance of the fundamentals with our students.

Yes, technology can and does and will continue to help us and our students in academic endeavors. But we cannot become so engrossed in teaching our students how to make technology useful to them that we overlook these basics. After all, we know that anybody can disseminate anything via the Internet. An educated person should be able, however, to sift through the inundation of information and find credible, reliable sources. Similarly, an editor or supervisor will more often than not check someone's written work before it goes public. But what about that one time when they don't?

I believe that with reiteration of the basics comes self-sufficiency when it involves technology.

The (lack of) formative assessment in instructional design

Having just learned and applied the ADDIE--Analysis, Design, Development, Implementation, and Evaluation--concept in 6430, I've noticed a peculiar circumstance: In spite of the desired effect of a learner-centered design construct, there seems very little emphasis on learner input into the process.

Where are opportunities for formative assessment from the intended learners?

The Brown/Green article that we read for our 09/22 class session mentioned that "one of the most effective methods for determining the success of your task analysis during the design and development of instruction is to ask a SME [subject matter expert] who was not part of the task analysis to look over what you created and to evaluate it for accuracy and thoroughness" (p. 116).

While I believe the SME can certainly validate the thoroughness of the ultimate product, I challenge the assertion that he/she can vouch for the effectiveness of it. In my mind, only the learner(s) can speak to that point. They will be the recipients of this product, and as the ones who actually utilize it, they will be better able to comment on its value.

In class on 09/01, we identified three values as imperative to instructional designers: efficiency, i.e., solving the problem without unnecessary steps; effectiveness, i.e., obtaining some degree of success; and appeal, i.e., motivating/drawing in the intended learner(s). To me, the learner(s) would be better able than a SME to tell the instructional designer(s) whether or not [1] the product contained any frivolous parts, [2] the product worked, and [3] the product interested them.

So why don't we consult them more often? To be fair, it seems apparent that the designer(s) could and should seek their input in the goals and/or learner assessments that typically occur as a part of the 'analysis' part of the ADDIE concept. But once the designer(s) reach the 'design' and 'development' stages, where they've generated a blue print and some deliverables, respectively, I think there should be more consultation with the target recipient group.

The Brown/Green article suggested a "summative evaluation activity" after the designer(s) implemented the instruction, but why wait until then? In the book, "How People Learn: Brain, Mind, Experience, and School," the National Research Council defined formative assessment as "ongoing assessments designed to make students' thinking visible to both teachers and students" (1999, p. 24) with a particular benefit to teachers to "identify problems that need to be remedied (problems that may not be visible without the assessments)" (p. 25).

Thus, I think it might be valuable for designers to incorporate a pilot group of learners into their design construct so the resultant product emerges with more inductive, formative feedback from the learners.

Learning explored

I thought I'd visit a question from our previous class that we left rhetorical: What is learning and how does it occur?

In the 2006-2007 academic year, I took a two-part course at ISU on leadership and learning, and I unearthed some of my thoughts at that time that pertained to this loaded question. Here's what I discovered:

"I guess I have discovered that learning--effective learning--can take a significant amount of effort. I concur that learning is primarily the work of the individual mind, but I also believe that the individual mind can be easily influenced and wooed by the expectations of society. In short, I think the individual mind has the capacity to be weak and underutilized. So, if learning can be the work of the individual mind, and the individual mind can be weak and underutilized, then does it not stand to reason that learning can be weak and underutilized? That is a question I have struggled to answer. Of course, it is most likely not as simple as the syllogism suggests, but I think there is some partial truth to it. We are cognitive misers, and if this course has taught me anything, it is the effective learning takes time and effort. My guess is that we often do not learn as much as we could or should."

I guess that, for the most part, I still agree with that explanation--at least for now. From this past course, I also derived a personal, working meaning for learning as "1] thinking, processing, and reflecting on an event or circumstance; 2] applying a newfound concept or idea." Again, I still believe in this two-prong definition, but I think it may be rather terse and simplistic.

Smith/Ragan article & chapter 1

Sort of a chicken or egg dilemma: Did Robert Gagne first inform instructional design theory or did theory provide a foundation for Gagne's work?

On page 4 in chapter 1, the authors acknowledge that the Dick and Carey Systems Approach model has been "heavily influenced by the work of Robert Gagne." And the Smith/Ragan definition of instructional design seems to resonate with Gagne's 9 instructional events. "The term instructional design refers to the systematic and reflective process of translating principles of learning and instruction into plans for instructional materials, activities, information resources, and evaluation" (Smith/Ragan, 1993, p. 2). Contrast this to the 9 events: 1] gaining attention; 2] informing learners of the objective(s); 3] stimulating recall of prior learning; 4] presenting the content; 5] providing the learning guidance; 6] eliciting performance; 7] providing feedback; 8] assessing performance; and 9] enhancing retention and transfer (Driscoll, 2005, p. 373).

I detect certain parallels, and while a connection between Gagne and instructional design theory seems quite evident, I wonder which emerged first?

my first blog!

While I frequently read blog posts, I've never contributed to one or created my own. Let's see if this works...