What Should Instructional Designers & Technologists Know About Human Performance Technology?

Human performance technology (HPT) is having a significant impact on the field of instructional design and technology (IDT), and many IDT graduate programs now offer training in HPT to their students. However, some IDT programs may be struggling with the extent to which they should incorporate the principles and techniques of HPT into their courses. To provide some determination of which specific skills and competencies in HPT graduates of IDT programs should have, an online survey was administered to 24 IDT faculty members and 45 members of local chapters of the International Society for Performance Improvement and the American Society for Training and Development. Respondents rated the importance of HPT competencies for graduates of IDT programs. Results suggest strong support for the inclusion of HPT concepts in the curricula of IDT graduate programs. Implications of these results for IDT graduate programs, as well as for distinguishing HPT as a field of specialization separate from IDT, are discussed.     

How Should Energy Be Defined Throughout Schooling?

The question of how to teach energy has been renewed by recent studies focusing on the learning and teaching progressions for this concept. In this context, one question has been, for the most part, overlooked: how should energy be defined throughout schooling? This paper addresses this question in three steps. We first identify and discuss two main approaches in physics concerning the definition of energy, one claiming there is no satisfactory definition and taking conservation as a fundamental property, and the other based on Rankine’s definition of energy as the capacity of a system to produce changes. We then present a study concerning how energy is actually defined throughout schooling in the case of France by analyzing national programs, physics textbooks, and the answers of teachers to a questionnaire. This study brings to light a consistency problem in the way energy is defined across school years: in primary school, an adapted version of Rankine’s definition is introduced and conservation is ignored; in high school, conservation is introduced and Rankine’s definition is ignored. Finally, we address this consistency problem by discussing possible teaching progressions. We argue in favor of the use of Rankine’s definition throughout schooling: at primary school, it is a possible substitute to students’ erroneous conceptions; at secondary school, it might help students become aware of the unifying role of energy and thereby overcome the compartmentalization problem.     

Should Exam Be Stopped?

The exam system has come to be the main topic of modern education.As it plays so important a role in the area of education that it is under much discussion as to its use.People who are for it try to develop this system more;those who are against it believe that such a system should be stopped.Should exam be stopped?In my opinion it should be.Firstly,a number of people think that an exam is the only way to test knowledge,but,in fact,that is not true.A few questions given in an exam could in no…     

Should China Be Unhappy?

Taken from the popular magazine Oriental Outlook Weekly, this selection features interviews with two of the authors of the best-selling book China Is Unhappy, as well as an interview with Xu Jilin, one of China's most prominent liberal scholars, reflecting the wide range of opinions on the rise of China and its implications for the world.     

What Does It Mean to Be an Educated Person?

Winner of the Philosophy of Education Society of Great Britain Student Essay Competition 2009 ¹ 1. The Philosophy of Education Society of Great Britain Student Essay Competition takes place each year. The winner receives a prize and is offered free attendance at the subsequent Annual Conference of the Society, held at New College Oxford. For details see: http://www.philosophy‐of‐education.org/students/default.asp .
The competition question ‘What Does It Mean To Be An Educated Person?’ is associated with a powerful and influential line of thought in the philosophy of R. S. Peters. It is a question that needs always to be asked again. I respond by asking what it means, now, to be an educated person—that is, how the value of being an educated person is currently understood, and, further, how it might be understood differently. The starting point of this paper then is not exactly the question of how we should best conceive of education, or of the educated person, in terms, for example, of initiation or of moral development. Instead I am concerned with who the supposedly educated person is today, according to the particular discourses and practices to which we are subject. I begin, then, by outlining the notion of the entrepreneurial self from the perspective of governmentality, with particular reference to questions of economy and the way in which the economic imperative is present in current policy. I then reconsider the idea of the educated person with reference to notions of economy and visibility as these relate to ideas of education and the self in Plato's The Republic. Discussion of readings of The Republic and of other texts of Plato by Stanley Cavell and Michel Foucault indicates how prevailing constructions of knowledge, practice, and subjectivity might be resisted. The question of what it means to be an educated person is thereby released from a particular mode of accounting for the self.     

Should Students Be Allowed to Miss?

ABSTRACT

Many educational policymakers consider attendance as a tool to induce learning. Researchers also agree that attendance has a positive effect on learning; however, there are few empirical studies that measure the nature and significance of that effect. The authors analyzed the effect of class attendance on academic performance and evaluated the existence and importance of a minimum attendance requirement. Using student data from a sample of public primary schools in Chile, and considering for endogeneity and sample selection bias, they found two important results. First, attendance had a relevant and statistically significant effect on educational performance. Second, the existence of a threshold was identified, but educational performance did not continue to decrease after a certain number of absences, which seems to contradict policies that have a minimum attendance requirement.     

How Should We Teach Sex?

In the face of differences about how sex should be taught to young persons, and consistent with a liberal principle of neutrality, educationalists can adopt one of two strategies. The 'retreat to basics' consists in teaching only a basic agreed code of sexual conduct, or a set of agreed principles of sexual morality. The 'conjunctive–disjunctive' strategy consists in teaching the facts of sexual activity together with the various possible evaluations of these facts. Both strategies are beset with significant and insuperable difficulties. Perhaps one should presume only to teach sex in a way that maximises the foundational liberal ideal of autonomy.     

Should Internet New Words Be Used Widely?

不明觉厉、男默女泪、火钳刘明、细思恐极、人艰不拆……这些令人,一头雾水,却貌似成语的网络新词,近日在网络世界流行开来。这些"成语"虽言简意赅却晦涩难懂。然而,也有不少网络词语正走进现实,它们不仅出现在青少年的作文中,甚至连《现代汉语词典》也收入了"囧"、"雷"这样的词汇。那么,网络新词是否会给传统语言文字带来负面效应?能否被广泛使用呢?     

How to Be A Good Guest?

Sarah is very happy. She is going to be 13 in two weeks. Her mother says it is a big day for a teenager. She said that Sarah could have a tea party to celebrate.There are20people in Sarah’s class.And her mother said she could invite all ofthem.So they bought beautiful cards andwrote down the guests’(客人的)names,andthe time,date and place of the party.Sarah’s mother also wrote down her phonenumber,so that guests could reply(答复).Then they posted the invitations.When you receive an invit…     

How Should One Read a Book?

Activity 1 Think about the following questions,and write down your answers before reading the essay?(1)When you happen to stay with a stranger,for example,another passenger sitting next to you on a train over a long haul,which are you more likely to do,to initiate talks,or to wait for him or her to do so?How would they be different?     

How to Be Happy

I believe happiness is what all the people are longing for. No matter what we are doing now, our ultimate goal will always be happiness. But how can we get happiness? A lot of people think that happiness is really hard to get. They're living a lonely and …     

How Effective are Instructional Explanations in Example-Based Learning? A Meta-Analytic Review

The worked example effect within cognitive load theory is a very well-established finding. The concrete effectiveness of worked examples in a learning situation, however, heavily depends on further moderating factors. For example, if learners improve their processing of worked examples by actively explaining the worked examples to themselves, they are usually better able to solve transfer problems. Another way to enhance example processing is to present learners with instructional explanations instead of prompting them to produce these explanations on their own. In this article, we review 21 experimental studies to address the issue whether instructional explanations support example-based learning. Meta-analytic results lead to three important conclusions: First, the benefits of instructional explanations for example-based learning per se are minimal. Second, instructional explanations are more helpful for acquiring conceptual knowledge than for acquiring procedural knowledge. Third, instructional explanations are not necessarily more effective than other methods supporting example processing such as self-explaining.