Why We Need Good Instructional Design By Vaughan Waller, Technologies for Business and Learning   Introduction Design is now part of all our daily lives. Just like literature, art, music and film, design is now a regular subject in magazines and newspapers. The names of designers or companies famous for their product design are now commonly known, such as Mies van der Rohe and Loewy or Tiffany and Lalique. And if these are not particularly famous, virtually every item we handle in our day to day lives has been designed by someone, somewhere. Architecture is one field of design which always produces poles of opinion. Where one group of people will admire and applaud a building others will compare it to a variety of objects never normally associated with buildings! But why are things “designed”? How many times do we look at something and remark that it is “badly designed” since it is unfit to do the job for which it was originally intended. Sometimes the design is beautiful to the eye but as a consequence of this, it is not fit for purpose – a chair that is uncomfortable to sit on or a car that is unreliable. Surely the purpose of designing any article of whatever type is that it is ultimately functional? But if that were the case then life would be very dull since everything that we live in and use in our lives, would have no aesthetic quality and the only result of design would be efficiency and fitness for purpose. It is said that any society that has art is by definition civilised so is art and design the same thing? This discussion started in the Renaissance when the word design was coined coming from the Italian word designo. Since then and for time immemorial just what design is and why it is necessary will be argued over. The one thing that is not in question however is that if any article was produced without input from a designer specialised in his or her field then it is unlikely to succeed in delivering its original aims and objectives. Imagine a toaster that was put into production by an accountant or a suite of furniture produced by a sheet metal company – it would simply be no good to its prospective user base. When it comes to a programme of instruction then the same rules apply. Whatever the delivery platform, whether week long instructor-lead courses or a five minute chunk of web delivered performance support it has to be designed correctly. This paper will discuss just what good design means in this context and what research exists to back up these claims.   Back to basics When any object is designed it has to have a final purpose. Even the most recent modern art is created to stimulate the senses or mind in some way. It is almost an abstract concept that anything can exist without purpose – everything on this earth has some purpose however obscure. A learning programme clearly has a purpose. Put very simply it is to either mend, bend or defend. We would create a learning programme to mend a broken business process or fill a skills gap We would create a learning programme to bend a workforce into doing procedures a different, presumably more efficient way and We would create a learning programme to defend or protect a workforce from harm in instances where there could be personal risk or there is a danger of loss of business integrity. The commissioning team (perhaps the training or personnel departments) would have ascertained that something needs to be done about something and they will have worked out that this can be addressed by the creation and use of a learning programme. By learning programme we do not mean a single item of instruction such as a module of CBT or an instructor led course. Instead a learning programme is one that includes a complete process of analysis, design, delivery and evaluation. The purpose of the programme will therefore be clear and at the top of the page – or so you would think. In many companies the original purpose of the learning programme is lost in the myriad of procedures required to get the process off the starting blocks. In some cases the wrong people are given the responsibility of drafting the original requisition and hence the wrong messages can be fed to the designers of the learning programme. If the designers are not clear on what the original purpose is then it should be no surprise that the programme fails. The old computer adage applies that rubbish put in usually results in rubbish coming out. Assuming however that the purpose is known and effectively communicated, what then? Many think that instructional design (a term without one clear definition but in the context of this paper describing the entire process of designing and delivering a learning programme) is how the multimedia programme on the computer will actually look like and yet this is only a very small (although very important) element in the jigsaw. It is important at this stage to grasp that instructional design is a process of many separate but inter-linked stages. It is also iterative, meaning that the process does not really have an end but once completed goes back to the beginning and starts all over again, virtually ad infinitum. There is no black art here – the process is clear and unambiguous and provided everyone understands why it is necessary, everyone’s objectives will be met. But if we are going back to basics then the First Principles which have been identified by M. David Merrill of Utah State University are a good place to start.   First Principles of Instructional Design Merrill suggests that fundamental principles for instructional design do exist and these apply regardless of the instructional design model used. Violating any of these first principles will produce a decrement in learning and performance. Merrill goes on to show that the most effective learning environments are problem-based and involve the student in four distinct phases of learning. Learning is facilitated when: Problem - learners are engaged in solving real-world problems. Learners are shown the task that they will be able to do or the problem they will be able to solve as a result of completing a module or course. Activation - new knowledge builds on the learner’s existing knowledge Learners recall or apply knowledge from relevant past experience as a foundation for new knowledge. This could be previous courses or job experiences. Demonstration - new knowledge is demonstrated to the learner Learners learn when the instruction demonstrates what is to be learnt rather than merely telling information about what is to be learnt. The media used must play a relevant instructional role. Application - new knowledge is applied by the learner This is the practice phase where learners are required to use their knowledge and skill to solve the problem. This could be a post test or guidance by a tutor or coach. Integration - new knowledge is integrated into the learner’s world This is the transfer phase where people apply or transfer their new-found knowledge or skills into their workday practices. This is enhanced if learners can a) demonstrate their new knowledge or skills, b) reflect-on, discuss their new knowledge and skills and c) can create , invent and explore new ways to use their new knowledge and skills.   First Principles of Instruction Diagram   Instructional Design Models So that designers of learning programmes can do their job effectively with the available information, they adopt an Instructional Design Model of which there are many. These models are the result of substantial research by learned academics over the years but comparing the various models is not the purpose of this paper. Knowing the names of these academics is one thing but it is quite another to understand why, to some, good instructional design is as much common sense as designing the handle on a mug to be important in the conveyance of hot beverages. At its simplest most instructional design models adopt a mnemonic, ADDIE. This is the basic five stages in the process. They are Analysis Firstly, establish if the required learning justifies the use of a complete instructional design process. It may be that the learning required is a simple intervention for a temporary performance shortfall and hence the full model would not be appropriate. Secondly, who are the learners and what are their learning needs? And thirdly, what is the objective of the learning and what subjects are to be covered? The most important part of the analysis stage is training needs assessment. This is a subject in itself and there are now substantial software tools and many books available to help along this part of the process. The result of this phase should be instructional goals – in other words what the whole exercise is for. But its actually more than this, since to know that the instructional goals have been met you will have to evaluate the instruction. If the goals have not been met then the process starts all over again. Design This stage looks at the subject matter, establishing the steps of instruction and the platform on which it is going to be delivered. Here the instructional designer will lay out the objectives for the learners and the more specific the objectives the more precise can be the design of the learning experiences. This is an important point since we all learn best as part of an experience. Think about it: when you last learnt something what were you doing? More than likely you were doing something either active or that was enjoyable. The science of learning is another vast subject on its own but it will be touched on briefly below. Development As the name suggests this stage is a process whereby the learning experiences (a course, a “blend” of learning media or even a paper based exercise) are created and tested. Depending on the size of the project, groups or individuals from the intended audience can take part in this process and hence, in doing so, refining the final product. From this you can determine four important points: Have you accurately analyzed the learning needs of the target audience? Were the aims and objectives of the learning programme appropriate for the target audience? Are the available resources and the learning experience itself adequate to meet the aims and objectives? Is the learning itself measurable or will it be impossible to find out if the programme has worked? The answers to these questions will enable revisions to be made before it is too late. Implementation Here the programme is “rolled out” to the students at large. In a corporate environment this will involve a strategy in itself since it will need internal marketing, the establishment of some form of learning management system to monitor track and control the learning programme and much effort to ensure that learners are motivated to start and finish the programme. It may be that this learning programme involves different platforms of delivery and the implementation must ensure that these are coordinated together. This would also require that tutors and coaches are on hand where necessary. Finally, the learners will take their learned skills or understanding into the workplace. Evaluation Putting aside the many possible ways of evaluating training the most important outcome of this phase is to gauge the success for the learners and whether the learning materials were effective. Whenever evaluation is mentioned the name Kirkpatrick (he invented a four stage process for the evaluation of learning programmes) comes up but this model is a process in its own right. More importantly it can only be used effectively if all the above has been effectively designed. The outcomes of the last evaluation phase will identify where the learning programme is succeeding and failing and consequently will produce areas that need analysis again. Hence the circle is completed and the learning process continues to evolve. On the second circuit lessons will have been learnt (in more ways than one) so the scope of the project can be expanded and aims and objectives revised and clarified. This iterative process will ultimately lead to the end-product of all learning programmes and that is a better trained workforce who are better able to meet the challenges of their work. Explaining some of that academic work There is a vast body of academic work on learning and often names are dropped into conversations, aiming to show that the speaker has knowledge of this work. Claiming that your bit of CBT reaches Bloom’s Taxonomy Level 4 can be just showing off especially since the vast majority of people have never heard of Bloom and would not know a taxonomy if they found one in their corn flakes. But the work can be used to great effect if only it was understood better. Most of the time the language is the problem (most of the work is based in human behavioural psychology) and often this makes the primary messages difficult to apply to, for instance, a corporate learning programme. What follows is an attempt to show where you can use this research to your benefit. There are literally dozens of educational and learning theories and the ones chosen below are those that can be applied to adult learning as well as to education. What is clear is that in most cases the theories are easy to understand. It is more than likely however, that the names given to them are far from being in common use and would not even be found in a good dictionary. The process of learning does not happen accidentally – it has been designed intentionally or otherwise by teachers, curriculum developers and many others. Behind the learning events are beliefs about what a student experiences during this process. Firstly therefore a very brief history of where it all started. Back in the 19th century educational practice had no theory behind it and was certainly not considered to be worthy of scientific analysis. Teachers were expected to teach facts while shaping character! But in the second half of the 19 th century European scholars started work on the scientific study of human behaviour. Schools of Psychology were established and from one of these emerged the American, Edward Thorndike who started applying this new science of psychology to the control of learning. He published a book in 1921 called Principles of Learning and this is still referred to today. Among the many suggestions in his book is that to learn anything, the subject material should be carefully refined and ordered and students should be supported throughout the process. He also suggested that one of the conditions for effective learning was intense practice and few would argue with that even now. Connectionism The learning theory that Thorndike suggested is called Connectionism and this is the original S-R (stimuli-responses) framework of behavioural psychology. Briefly, learning is the result of associations forming between stimuli and responses. This is the classic “trial and error” learning in which certain responses come to dominate others due to rewards. The basic principles of Connectionism are that: learning requires both practice and a reward transfer of learning occurs because of previously encountered situations. And intelligence is a function of the number of connections learned. Example – A cat learns how to escape from a box by pressing a lever inside. After much trial and error the cat learns to associate pressing the lever (the stimulus) with opening the door (the response). The S-R connection is established because the cat practiced it and received a reward by escaping. In applying this to the creation of a programme of instruction the designer should ensure that the learner is presented with, for instance, simulations where the actual practice of solving the problem results in the reward of success. Conditions of Learning Another big name in this field is Robert Gagné. His theory stipulates that there are several different types of learning and he identifies five major categories: Intellectual skills Cognitive (the process of acquiring knowledge) strategies Verbal information Motor skills Attitudes Different conditions are necessary for each type of learning. For instance, for cognitive strategies to be learned, there must be a chance for the learner to practice developing new solutions to problems and to learn attitudes the learner must be exposed to a credible role model or persuasive arguments. His theory also outlines nine instructional events and the corresponding cognitive process. This is best described in an exercise to recognise an equilateral triangle. 1) Gain attention – show a variety of computer generated triangles (this is reception) Identify objective – pose the question “what is an equilateral triangle?” (this is expectancy) Recall prior learning – review definition of triangles (this is retrieval) Present stimulus – give definition of an equilateral triangle (this is selective perception) Provide learning guidance – show example of how to create an equilateral triangle (this is semantic encoding) Elicit performance – get the learner to create 5 different examples ( this is responding) Provide feedback – check the work for correctness (this is reinforcement) Assess performance – provide scores (retrieval again) Enhance retention – show pictures and ask students to identify equilaterals (this is generalization). These events provide the necessary conditions for learning and serve as the basis for designing instruction and selecting the appropriate media on which to do it. Among Gagné’s several main principles is that different types of instruction are required for different learning outcomes. It is interesting to note that good teachers or lecturers probably practice Gagné’s steps intuitively. Bloom’s Taxonomy of Educational Objectives Dr Benjamin Bloom intended to develop a classification framework for writing educational objectives. Each of the six levels is more complex or of a higher order cognitively than the previous one and that is why instructional designers often attempt to make their programmes conform to one of Bloom’s levels. Few actually achieve anything beyond level 3 but unfortunately there is no official body which could confirm or ratify this. Hence, courseware manufacturers can claim that they are presenting a programme to level 4 and unless you are a real expert you probably couldn’t argue the fact. Technology based training in general is best when handling basic facts and concepts. Anything further than this requires work away from the computer and usually in a group where human-to-human interaction takes place. Consequently, virtually any programme claiming level 4 compliance would be seldom actually that. It could suggest exercises that would be level 4 but the work would be done by the student not the programme. The six levels in the cognitive domain are as follows with some basic examples: Knowledge – recognizing or recalling information, eg Who wrote Hamlet? Comprehension – demonstrating that the student has sufficient understanding of the subject matter, eg What did Hamlet mean when he said “To be or not to be, that is the question”? Application - a question that will force the student to use previously learned information eg You know what socialism is so which of the following countries according to what you have learnt are socialist? Analysis – this is where students are asked to think critically and in depth. In this category students are asked to engage in three types of cognitive process Identifying motives, reasons and/or causes for something, eg Why was Israel selected as the site for the Jewish nation? Considering and analysing available information and then reaching a conclusion, inference or generalization, eg After studying the French, American and Russian revolutions what can you say about the causes of revolutions? Synthesis – where students are asked to perform original and creative thinking. This could be in several ways producing original communications eg Write a letter on a political issue that concerns you. Make predictions eg Where would the UK be if John Major had won the 1997 general election? Solve problems eg how can you count the number of fish in a pond without counting them? Evaluation – this is where students are asked to solve a problem which does not have a single correct answer or may involve the student’s own opinion. To answer this sort of question, objective criteria or personal values must be applied. Eg Do you think that Tony Blair should agree to President Bush’s request to site parts of the missile defence system on British soil? Clearly therefore to do anything beyond level 3 in a computer programme would be very difficult. The levels as well as being hierarchical are cumulative, meaning that each level subsumes the previous one. This enables the student to progress to the higher levels of understanding. If however the purpose of the teaching is to change attitudes or behaviour then the instruction should progress through the Affective Domain. Here there are 5 levels again all hierarchical and cumulative. In brief these are: Receiving – a classroom activity with the simple objective being that the student knows that something exists. Responding – active participation such as a classroom discussion which would get the students response to the material. Valuing – the worth a student attaches to a particular event which would show commitment or acceptance. Organisation – bringing together different values and resolving conflicts which should show the understanding of systematic planning in solving problems. Characterisation by values – the person has held a set of values that has determined his attitudes and even lifestyles. At this level this person would be aware of his/her personal social and emotional adjustment and would be able to objectively discuss them. Andragogy This theory is directed specifically at adult learning and was written by M. Knowles. He suggests that adults are self-directed and are expected to take responsibility for their decisions. Andragogy makes the following assumptions about the design of learning: Adults need to know why they need to learn something. Adults need to learn experientially Adults approach learning as problem-solving, and Adults learn best when the topic is of immediate value. Put another way instruction for adults should concentrate more on the process and less on the content being taught. Case studies, role playing, simulations and self-evaluation are preferred. Instructors adopt a role of facilitator or resource rather than lecturer or grader. It could be said that this learning theory could have been written with e-learning in mind but wasn’t! Experiential Learning Written by C. Rogers this distinguishes between two types of learning, cognitive such as learning vocabulary and experiential which is learning for instance about engines in order to repair a car. According to Rogers, learning is facilitated when The student participates completely in the learning process and has control over its nature and direction It is primarily based on practical, social or research problems Self-evaluation is the principal method of assessing progress or success. Basically therefore self-initiated learning is the most lasting and pervasive. Again, every organisation around the world will recognise that if resistance to lifelong learning is overcome, those students who really discover learning again invariably achieve good results. There are of course many other theories including esoterically named ones such as Cognitive Dissonance, Algo-Heuristic Theory and Stimulus Sampling Theory but suffice is to say that once studied all these have elements that although based in human psychology, also have some basis in common sense. It is often the case that instructional designers know the principles of these theories but have no idea who documented them. How therefore should all this be used? As we have seen above instructional design is a great deal more than the process of creating a multimedia or perhaps web-based piece of training courseware but is the design of the courseware itself important? The answer to this is of course in the affirmative but that leads to the next question which is “Then what is the difference between designing an individual piece of courseware and an entire learning programme?” The answer, which may be a shock to many, is none. As with any learning programme, regardless of the final platform, the process starts with the Analysis phase – the establishment of the instructional goals. These will have been worked out, probably by the training department within an organisation, in consultation with as many interested parties as possible. Following this a decision will have been made that perhaps technology based learning is appropriate and the green light will be given to produce a bit of courseware. This is just one part of the overall instructional design model and it could be viewed as layers of an onion – each one more or less the same but on a different scale. There are three main stages in creating for instance e-learning courseware. The Subject Matter Expert A subject matter expert is employed to write the content of the course. Ideally, this person may already be teaching or lecturing on this subject using other learning media. This person will have extensive experience in this particular subject and will be able to test learners to establish if the subject material has been learnt after the course. Their work will be to create the framework of the course and to write all the text and questions. The Course Designer This person will probably have little or no specialist knowledge of the subject matter but their expertise will be in taking the text and questions from the SME and making it work as a piece of instruction. This person will of course be following the Instructional Design Model as described above. They will be briefed on why the training intervention has become necessary, what is the required outcome, what are the available platforms, what the budget is and manage the process of the two “D’s”, design and development. The Programmer This person is probably a “back-room” person. Someone who takes instructions from the Course Designer and his/her project team to convert the design of the programme into something that will run on the chosen platform. In writing the course this person may well have to ensure that standards are adhered to such as AICC, IMS or SCORM so that when the instruction is launched by the company’s Learning Management System, scores from pre, post, or any other tests can be monitored and logged. Once complete the course is implemented probably within a pilot group and evaluated. The results of this will be fed back and whatever changes are needed would be made by the Course Designer and the Programmer. There may also be changes in the way the course is delivered, tutor support may be added or adapted in some way or the instructional goals developed as a result of the trial period. Hence the cycle continues until the instructional design process is complete. Things never stay the same for long however so periodically the goals should be reviewed and the process repeated. But what about Andragogy, Bloom’s Taxonomy and all those other learning theories? The answer is simple – they are used as part of the design process. There is no simple “right way” to design a learning programme. Robert Gagné said himself that “In seeking a way of dealing with multiple objectives, other than serially, we perceive a need for treating human performance at a somewhat higher level of abstraction than is usual in most instructional design models.” (1990) There are however, tools for planning and analysis lifted from the various theories and models which can be applied to the design of technology based training which will inform and improve the finished product. Conclusion Pundits consider that the e-learning industry is currently vendor driven and many companies concentrate on being commissioned to create bespoke courseware. In many cases the proffered qualifications to do this task successfully are carried by a body of existing work which could in some cases be little more than a website. Seldom do companies wishing to commission work probe as to which instructional design model would be used or whether and how, the content would approach the third or fourth level of Bloom’s Taxonomy. This is understandable because few people have heard of these things or remotely understand their importance. Neither is it suggested that these names are trotted out as “nasty” questions to put the salesman “on the back foot”. What everyone wants in this scenario is good effective instruction that will repay the investment and improve the quality of the company’s services and the confidence of its workforce. The hard work has already been done by Gagné, Bloom, Thorndike and many others. This work just has to used effectively to make all programmes of instruction meet their original purpose whatever that was deemed to be. Vaughan Waller has more than 17 years experience in the technology based training industry, and runs his own consultancy Technologies for Business and Learning www.tfbal.co.uk . Although all aspects of e-learning are of interest, Vaughan has specialised in providing help and advice within the areas of implementing e-learning within an organisation. He is also elected chairman of the e-Learning Network – the UK’s premier e-learning association. The eLearning Network is a long established non-profit organisation run by a committee of learning professionals for all those interested in the application of technologies to learning. The aim is to provide the lead in the use of best practice in all aspects of learning technologies. For further information go to www.elearningnetwork.org Vaughan can be contacted on vaughan@tfbal.co.uk