Sometimes in thinking up a design, you can have the best didactical intention (referent 1) in mind, your specification or databank (referent 2) filled with the right needs, an existing design (referent 3) sending out interesting signals, and yet you are still waiting — waiting for that ‘click’ as the parts of the puzzle fall into place and your decision-making goes racing and tumbling to its conclusion. Continue reading
The formal definition of the term ‘design’ as it will be used in this book, and as it applies at the micro level, is: The plan, structure and strategy of instruction used, conceived so as to produce learning experiences that lead to pre-specified learning goals.
The activities involved in designing a course or lesson are illustrated in Fig. 1. By name, they will be quite familiar to those of you who know and have used the so-called ‘systems approach’ at the micro level. Activity 4 in the activity cycle (Fig. 1) is the one which interests us most in this book.
The answer to this, for design decision-making at the micro level, is ‘yes’. Continue reading
Tyler (1949) has provided a useful definition for designers working at the micro level:
‘A learning experience refers to the interaction between the learner and the external conditions in the environment to which he can react. Learning takes place through the active behaviour of the student; it is what he does that he learns not what the teacher does.’
This definition has many implications for the design of instruction. We will come back to it again, directly or indirectly, more than once.
