Two library orientation methods, a self-guided cassette walking tour and a slide-tape program, were administered to 202 freshmen students to determine if moving through the library increased students' ability to develop a mental map of the library. An effort was made to ensure that the two orientation programs were equivalent. Results from the 148…

This paper compares the content of two types of instruction presented to a student either by an intelligent tutoring system or by some conventional text, such as a textbook or a computer user's manual, when the educational goal is skills learning. Two distinct points of view are presented: (1) that of the "expounders," who believe that…

In this field experiment, first and second grade children were given the opportunity to listen to radio instruction coordinated with a television cartoon. The experimenters measured to what extent children watched the cartoon, listened to the radio instruction, and learned vocabulary words taught via radio. (Author)

Designed to identify promising methods of teaching library reference skills to elementary school students, this study included an extensive search of the literature and a pilot experiment to test the effectiveness of the methods identified. Testing materials, a transparency lecture series, and a self-paced instructional module with cassette tape…

The first of two papers describes the techniques used at a school of nursing to develop 98 independent learning modules for an on-going, statewide, continuing education project designed to meet the needs of professional nurses practicing in the field. The paper focuses primarily on the administrative problems related to the project; e.g., test…

This study was undertaken to determine the effects of individualized instruction on enrollment, attrition, achievement, and student attitude in a general biology course for non-science majors. Fifteen auto-tutorial minicourses were designed for use in the laboratory part of the course, each consisting of a printed study guide, slide-tape module,…

This study describes the development of an innovative instructional technique, peculiar to television, that presents information in a dramatic form through televised skits. Primary concerns of the project were the measurement of student attitudes toward receiving instructional television material in skit form, the measurement of the amount of…

A series of studies investigating effects of alternative methods of writing, arranging, and responding in programed instruction are presented and the results are summarized to provide guidelines for use in program preparation. In a comparison of overt and covert response modes no differences were obtained on an immediate post-program criterion…

The comparative efficacy of overt and non-overt practice responses in programed instruction was investigated under a variety of practice and test conditions using a paired associate learning task. Proponents of operant learning models have consistently questioned the relative effectiveness of passive viewing in programed instruction. An…

Impressions of health educators in the specialty fields of community, patient, and school health are presented concerning the scope of their profession, commonalities and differences in their professional preparation, and recommendations for directions to follow in developing a systematic and coordinated competency assurance program. This…

Two mediated approaches to individualized instruction--computer-assisted (PLATO) and individualized booklet--were compared in terms of their effect on student achievement. Computer-assisted instruction offers potentially sophisticated use of individualized instruction techniques (e.g., random selection of items, sequencing, and answer judging, but…

Mathematical learning at six cognitive levels, in areas of exact and varied repetition, was studied in 28 educable mentally handicapped students (mean IQ 74, mean age 12.6). Four different machine-presented programs of 10 lessons each utilized inductive or deductive modes of presentation and exact or varied forms of curriculum repetition. Results…

In the first of three studies, separately reported, the effects of prompting and sequencing on a science concept task were studied with college students. The data analysis showed that the prompting procedure was significantly different from a no-prompting condition; prompting seemed to negate the affect of the defined concept instructional…

A seventh-grade class took tests in block design problems to determine the importance of three techniques of programed instruction. The techniques under consideration were sequencing, cueing, and individual response. The research design looked at the performance of three ability levels (high, medium, and low) divided by sex over five program…

The findings of an experiment are reported in which 28 students taking a graduate level course in techniques of programed instruction were randomly assigned to either cathode ray tube (CRT) or teletype terminals. Results from the analysis of the final concept test data revealed that students performed equally well regardless of terminal device.…