Discussion of instructional design for training focuses on the lack of tools that support the developmental phases of analysis, design, and evaluation. Topics include a standard instructional systems design model and an integrated software support system called "Designer's Edge," which focuses on the common activities of instructional…

Describes a visual tutoring system for programming distributive-memory multiprocessor networks. Highlights include difficulties of parallel programming, and three instructional modes in the system, including a hypertext-like lecture, a question-answer mode, and an expert aid mode. (Author/LRW)

Examined advance organizer research to determine its implications for instructional designers planning learning activities and instructional media, particularly the relationship between the forms of advance organizer and media. Found few studies comparing forms of organizers or the relationship between forms or organizers and media, indicating a…

Examines the issue of educational accountability and suggests the need for a new design leading to a restructuring or transformation of instruction in keeping with the social and economic needs of the 21st century. Presents a model for educational change and considers what elements make a successful school. (LRW)

There is a rich theoretical base for cooperative learning. Three interrelated types have been developed (formal, informal, cooperative base groups) that provide a framework for effective college teaching. However, too much emphasis is placed on developing the skills of individuals and too little on creating learning communities within which…

Describes collaborative effort to evaluate and improve the Web-based Quest adventure series. Finds, for example, that students' reasoning ability improved after implementation of research-based instructional design guidelines. (Contains 22 references.) (PKP)

Discusses the need to develop leadership in the library profession and describes leadership training methods. Highlights include core values and beliefs guiding leadership training; critical leadership traits; a design model for leadership training; strategies for administrators to develop leadership within their libraries; and stages of…

Describes research that was conducted to discover principles for the design of educational tasks that provoke collaborative argumentation, concentrating on the relationship between question asking and argumentation. Discusses results from experiments with three different collaborative learning tasks involving university students and examines the…

Discusses the need for innovation in online learning and suggests that online learning in universities and corporate training should focus on problem solving. Recommends the implementation of problem and domain-specific problem architectures in online delivery packages and describes two possible examples of such architectures. (LRW)

Discusses organic architecture and suggests that learning environments should be designed and constructed using an organic approach, so that learning is not viewed as a distinct human activity but incorporated into everyday performance. Highlights include an organic knowledge-building model; information objects; scaffolding; discourse action…

Discusses the value of feedback in performance improvement and reviews an emerging theoretical perspective called feedback intervention theory as well as emerging technologies and practices related to feedback delivery in instruction. Topics include theories of learning; electronically mediated communication; and immediate feedback. Contains 53…

Examines three views of performance improvement--scientific management, instructional design, and systems thinking--each providing a unique view of performance improvement and specific roles for evaluation. Provides an integrated definition of performance and a synthesis model that encompasses the three views. (AEF)

Provides the example of writing as a subject in which an educator might design instruction so that students think their way through the logic of the subject rather than memorize bits and pieces of someone else's thought (never grasping its logic). Presents four instructional steps: prethinking the course, student orientation, initial practice, and…

Discusses how the learning context becomes social and interactive in drama work which engages young children in emergent experiences. Describes a program where curriculum is implemented over a time frame of four 35-45 minute sessions. Concludes that design and implementation of drama must work together to provide children with rich, emergent…

Examines the "media effects" debate-whether media in and of itself affects learning-and presents an analysis of various arguments from a learning theory perspective. Proposes a dynamic process of instructional design where assessments are aimed at instructional practices as well as learning outcomes, and instructional media and method…