An invasion in the classroom: influence of an ill-structured innovation on instructional and epistemological beliefs

In this article, the actual impact on students' instructional and epistemological beliefs of systematic attempts to implement a problembased, collaborative and technologicallyrich learning environment in regular, internationallyspread, secondary school classrooms is described. Although the literature suggests that learning environments do affect both categories of beliefs, empirical evidence is currently limited. To study the effects of learning environments, classroombased learning environments were redesigned in various respects. The change entailed the implementation of a problembased, collaborative and technologicallyrich environment to replace the more regular contentdriven, teachercentred and textbookbased environment. The implementation of the innovation was hypothesised to result in a change of both the instructional and epistemological beliefs of students. Moreover, these beliefs were expected to evolve in the direction of the assumptions underlying the innovative environment. A classical pretest and posttest study resulted in the confirmation of the first hypothesis. However, for the second hypothesis, the opposite was found: students' beliefs strengthened in a direction that contradicts the basic principles underlying the designed environment. The study highlights that a poor implementation of potentially powerful learning environments can result in unexpected and even undesirable side effects.     

The civic‐minded instructional designers framework: An alternative approach to contemporary instructional designers' education in higher education

This paper argues that an emphasis on training‐for‐the‐job approaches has distracted designers from thinking about the meaning of their profession and the grand purpose of practising instructional design. Drawing from literature in the fields of sociology and educational technology, this paper synthesises discourses on civic professionalism in instructional design and technology, and proposes a conceptual framework that highlights the roles and qualities of a civic‐minded instructional designer. It is claimed that a critical discussion on civic professionalism in the field of educational technology can offer an alternative perspective on educating instructional designers, and have practical implications on instructional design and technology curricula in higher education.     

The strategic impact model: An integrative approach to performance improvement and instructional systems design

Conclusion The Strategic Impact Model is distinctive in its portrayal of the integration of instructional and non-instructional interventions and its suggestion that all performance interventions undergo an analysis-design-development-production cycle, just as instruction does. It also differs from other similar models in its use of evaluative activities at each stage to assure alignment with strategic needs as well as quality control, and its suggestions for improving the chances of successful implementation by carrying out change management activities at each phase of the development process. He has special interests in distance education, historical and philosophical foundations of instructional technology and instructional development processes. He has special interests in planning and evaluating performance improvement initiatives, including training. An erratum to this article is available at .     

Managing courseware production: An instructional design model with a software engineering approach

In applied courseware production settings, two equally important processes tend to vie for attention: Instructional Design (ID) and Management. Together, these two processes comprise instructional systems development (ISD). To ensure the instructional appropriateness of courseware, an ID model is proposed to remind producers of the important instructional factors and process. This model contains three stages. The analysis stage draws out and documents background information. The development stage constructs content, measurement, strategies, media, and settings. This stage can be further divided into prototype design and formal production. The last stage is the evaluation stage which includes pilot testing and summative evaluation.This paper also proposes a project template to manage production activities based on a software engineering approach. This template prescribes a procedural flow, role explanation, and task definition. It helps producers to estimate and coordinate the efforts of the production team. Its step-by-step confirmation ensures that the courseware product will meet the customer's needs. An example project was used to verify the usefulness of the ID model and project template.     

Assessing instructional conceptions: A task-based approach

ABSTRACT

This article addresses the labour market effects of two rather different forms of vocational education, full‐time education with practice periods that have no employment status versus dualized education with an emphasis on continuous on‐the‐job/in‐service training and employee status for the apprentice. Although most developed countries know both forms of vocational education, these usually have clearly different positions in a qualitative (standardization of curricula and degrees) and a quantitative (cohort shares) sense. The Netherlands present an interesting case, because in this country both systems coexist and contribute largely to the vocational training of each new generation. That provides a good opportunity for investigating differences in the labour market effects of these ‘treatments’ in vocational education. In this article, differences in labour market careers (i.e. the chances of getting promoted or getting unemployed) between graduates from full‐time vocational education and from the dual system are explored, using event history analysis. The results show that graduates from full‐time tracks have higher chances of getting promoted. However, the period of transition to the labour market is very unstable, involving job shifts and periods of unemployment. Graduates from the dual system on the other hand experience a more stable period of labour market entry. At the same time their careers often involve many dead‐end jobs, from which no promotion takes place. Moreover, they have difficulty in transfering their skills to other sectors than the sector for which they are trained.     

Clark's invitation to the dance: An instructional Designer's response

He would like to thank his colleague, Walter Dick, for suggesting he examine this issue from the point of view of an instructional designer. He would also like to thank his medical consultants—Dr. Mark Shamis, Dr. William Kaufman, and Linda Reiser, RN.     

What can we learn from chaos theory? An alternative approach to instructional systems design

In this article, the “goodness of fit” between ISD and chaos theory is explored by applying the key concepts of chaos theory to the process of developing an alternative ISD model. After a brief introduction to chaos theory and an exploration of the limitations of and/or the problems with conventional ISD models, the theoretical implications for developing an alternative ISD model are explored. The assumptions of a conventional ISD model are compared to those of chaos theory and dynamic nonlinear systems in order to derive theoretical implications and recommendations for future research and practice in instructional systems design and development.     

In search of instructional utility: A function-based approach to pictorial research

In spite of considerable research on various aspects of pictures and their instructional uses, a clear conception of the instructional potential of pictures is missing. As a result, practitioners who deal directly with the instructional process are limited in their ability to use pictures most effectively and efficiently. The approach to picture research described here attempts to make research more relevant by suggesting the need to pay greater attention to the instructional role or function served by pictures. Potential functions must be described in terms of their contribution to instructional processes and procedures. Functions should also be applicable to a wide variety of objectives, strategies, and procedures. The relevance of this approach to both basic and applied pictorial research is also discussed.