The aims of university System Dynamics (SD) programs include the mastery of systems thinking skills, modeling skills, and/or application to solving real-world, dynamic, complex problems. Existing research has articulated learning sequences of what learners should know and be able to do, and when. It is called the competence development framework…

Education ecology is a new crossover research field in network age. Its research content can be either microscopic classroom teaching or macro educational ecology research on teaching and culture. The university music classroom is a special kind of ecology. The reason why this is special is that compared to natural ecology, the classroom ecology…

My dissertation explores how elicited gestures can support 6th grade students' understanding of nonlinear dynamics of complex systems. My hypothesis is that elicited gestures make these patterns salient to the student, who learns about these quantitative dynamics via embodied mechanisms. To elicit these gestures, I designed a computer simulation…

The Soil Nutrient Relationships course serves juniors and seniors with a major or minor in agronomy at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Pre-pandemic enrollment averaged 65 students. In 2021 and 2022, course enrollment was 42 and 55, respectively. The course was adjusted to a flipped design in 2017. Moving into 2021, the Soil Nutrient…

The issues experienced by general teachers (GT) in instruction in an inclusive classroom in primary school are the difficulty of designing effective instructional strategies that can meet all students' needs with various uniqueness. This research investigates GTs' experiences of the brain's natural learning systems-based instructional approach in…

There is much research in the scholarly literature about using technology to support language learning, and particularly English as a Foreign Language, but the technology is rarely integrated into the curriculum, largely because the research is the product of the pressure on faculty to publish. The author explores curriculum integration, based on…

Recent surveys of information technology management professionals show that understanding business domains in terms of business productivity and cost reduction potential, knowledge of different vertical industry segments and their information requirements, understanding of business processes and client-facing skills are more critical for…

Artificial intelligence research on creative design has led to Structure-Behavior-Function (SBF) models that emphasize functions as abstractions for organizing understanding of physical systems. Empirical studies on understanding complex systems suggest that novice understanding is shallow, typically focusing on their visible structures and…

Scope and Method of Study: This study develops, implements, and evaluates a new economics teaching pedagogy based on the U.S. Army's systems approach to training model. Using the approach, tasks are identified that compose the task domain for the Principles of Microeconomics course. From the 130 identified tasks, 73 are used by Economics of…

Representations such as drawings, graphs, and computer simulations, are central to learning and doing science. Furthermore, ongoing success in science learning requires students to build on the representations and associated practices that they are presumed to have learned throughout their schooling career. Without these practices, students have…

The school-aged population continues to diversify, yet the student body at small liberal arts teacher preparation programs generally does not. To help prepare our socioculturally homogeneous students to teach a more diverse student body, we developed a three-tiered approach that includes a diversity model integrated across the curriculum, an…

Discusses the relationship of constructivism with instructional design theory. Topics discussed include instructional systems development; objectives; learning versus instruction; deep learning versus surface learning; situated learning versus formal instruction; adaptive learning; and the role of interactive educational technology in the design…

Considers the relevance of cognitive learning theory to instructional design for effective learning. Highlights include the organization of knowledge; systems approach; cognitive process learning; schema theory; and components of a model for instructional design, including pretesting, motivational considerations, media selection, and validation.…

The University of Houston-Clear Lake has developed a systematic design process to use in facilitating the development of online distance education courses. The process incorporates three semesters, during which faculty members have the opportunity to consult with a design team that consists of instructional designers, World Wide Web developers,…

Discusses educational developers, their role in the preparation and delivery of distance education courses, and their interaction with teachers. Highlights include theories of educational development; a systems approach to educational technology; curriculum planning; setting educational objectives; designing instruction; and student assessment and…