5.3 On-the-spot designing
Once a course or lesson has been installed and is in process, the design takes over. Students and teacher (if there is one) and materials and the design rock back and forth and interact with each other in a ‘response environment’ for learning. If your decision-making has been good in creating this environment there is […]
5.4 End evaluation
Once a course or lesson you have designed is over, you will need to look into the mirror of an end evaluation (activity 1). You will need to validate the quality of your own design decision-making. This end evaluation is always a moment of truth. You will be surprised (sometimes pleasantly and some-times not so […]
5.5 Case study no. 6: Troubleshooting refrigeration systems
The usual long, hot summer. In Townville, Illinois, manager Joseph D Doe of the Buy-It-Here supermarket chain is getting hot under the collar. For the sixth time in three days he is listening to another complaint from one of his branch managers about ‘poor freezer maintenance service’. There is a pattern in the complaints which […]
4.1 Introduction
Every freshly made course or lesson is unique. It carries the fingerprint of its designer’s design decision-making. The last convolutions in the print come from decisions made as you test-and-revise (activity 4.3) a thought-up, worked-out design. The test is made with the help of a small group of learners, chosen at random but representative of […]
4.2 Testing for the unexpected
In the developmental testing of a design, you are testing for the unexpected: for unexpected wrong responses, unexpected interfering responses and unexpected attitudes of learner and teacher (if one is involved). These things are ‘unexpected’ because with the help of the four referents and the protocol for working out a design, you have done your […]
4.3.1 The missing imperatives
Learners can like being told what to do. ‘Think aloud’, Draw a diagram’, ‘Talk to yourself about….. ‘Label this picture’, ‘Explain this to….. ‘Match the items in List A with those in list B’, ‘Conjure up a mental picture of….’Explain to your neighbour….. ‘Listen to the silence in this film’ — these are some of […]
4.3.2 The missing overview
Learners like to know where they are going. They need some navigational aid (verbal or visual) at the very start of the course or lesson which maps out, or hints at, the response route they are going to take. In the world of design at the micro level, this is often called an ‘overview’. This […]
4.3.3 The impracticality of a design
‘Nice’, ‘good’, ‘beautiful’, ‘exciting’, but remaining for ever gathering dust in its worked-out form on the designer’s shelf: this is sometimes the fate of a good design.
4.3.4 The missing melody
An S-R event in which the primary goal is `to instruct’ has a sharp, business-like sound to it. It has to deliver some pre-defined knowledge or skill. In contrast, an S-B, event which is an ‘encounter’ gives the learner plenty of room to respond in her or his own way. An encounter has no end-performance […]
4.3.5 The non-integration problem
How many times as a teacher or designer have you heard the complaint that the separate parts of a course ‘don’t seem to belong to each other’? You have probably had to respond to the complaint of non-integration in a course or lesson more than once. It’s a common problem.