I recently read a blog post by Janet Clarey highlighting the need to go back to the basics.
These 'basics' are different for everyone. But like all subjects and bodies of knowledge, there are a few foundational concepts that have been identified and acknowledged as such. Without knowing and understanding these basics, we can't claim to be successfully practicing our subject - the subject of instructional design.
No sooner did I tell Janet that I'd like to contribute to an elearning site on the basics, I encountered a query (not the first). I am posting parts of the query (and I am sure my dear friend & colleague will not mind me doing so!)
"…she doesn't have an ID background...are there any websites or books that she could read for guidance and basically on how to get started...can you suggest some sites or books that may be good with fundamentals…"
And so begins the struggle of a first-time instructional designer.
For my friend and many others out there who have often called and written to me asking about good websites and books for learning the basics of Instructional Design AND for others who don't know me but are no less interested in a good list of resources… well, here's my top 10!
This list is a combination of books and sites that offer theory, models, examples, and mentors!
My list of top 10 resources on Instructional Design - basics and more:
1. What Everybody Ought to Know About Instructional Design - Tom Kuhlmann's articulation of the importance of instructional design/role of an instructional designer - simply superb! I have often used this video and the associated text when conducting training on ID basics for new hires in the field.
2. The Instructional Design Knowledgebase - Retrieved August 03, 2010 from Nada Dabbagh's Homepage, George Mason University, Instructional Technology Program. - An excellent and very comprehensive site that talks all about instructional design and the ISD Process. A good place to start with the basics and then continue learning. Infact, if there was one single resource that I had to choose - it would be this one!
3. Instructional Systems Design (ISD) - An excellent resource to understand the ISD process, ADDIE Model or Systems Approach to Training (SAT).
4. ID Models - Use this site to learn about design, instructional design, and models of instructional design.
5. Instructional Design & Learning Theory - Refer to this white paper to learn more about the three basic theories of learning. Trust me, you will keep coming back to this resource. As you progress in your field and gain experience, the words will offer deeper meanings.
6. Essential Reading for Instructional Design - Well, the list of books recommened by Cammy Bean should fit into the learning library of any instructional designer - new and experienced.
7. Top-10 Books on ID - A site that lists the top 10 ID books recommended by eminent scholars, theorists, and practitioners in instructional design and technology. Specific books are repeatedly nominated - those are the foundational ones.
8. The 60 Minutes Masters - A free course designed by Clive Shepherd and his team to train Subject Matter Experts (SMEs) in Instructional Design. But really, the basics here are applicable for all roles involved in the process.
9. Top E-learning Blogs of 2009 - An excellent resource that gives a list of top blogs by some exceptional people. Start reading and following these blogs to keep learning.
10. Elearning Learning - A community collecting and organizing the best information on the web about eLearning.
Having shared the list above, I must add that I don't have any formal education in instructional design. Also, I don't claim to be an expert who knows it all. So, the list above is by no means the most comprehensive.
But I do know that these sites have been useful and helpful to me. After practicing instructional design for 11 years, I often go back to these basics. Everything I know and have gathered is because I teach others (and teaching is the best learning activity!) and I try to practice and do what I learn.
So, for all you budding instructional designers - you won't learn much just by reading. Find opportunities to apply and practice what you have learnt. Learn by doing.
PS: For my readers - If you have any websites/books/blogs/other resources that have been useful for you in your journey of all things teaching/learning/instructional design, I'd be happy to add the same to my list!
Tuesday, August 3, 2010
Saturday, July 24, 2010
Is Blogging Dying?
I recently read an article in The Economist highlighting a report that shows that "the rate of growth of blogs has slowed in many parts of the world. In some countries growth has even stalled".
Yes, perhaps it is true that blogging is growing at a far lesser rate than it was 10 years ago. But I don't think blogging is dying! The trends are changing. Our expectations as bloggers and readers are changing.
Since 2004, many Analysts have written about how social-media is just a fad and how twitter and facebook status messages will eventually take over blogging. If we were to believe reports, then in 2007 Gartner predicted that blogging will peak in 2008 and then it will fizzle out. But I don't think the fizzle is out just yet.
But here are some interesting statistics that provide another view:
Annual State of the Blogosphere 2009 report provided by Technorati states that:
Just like everything else in life, we want access to the latest and the most cutting-edge! But that does not indicate that we forget the old or that old is not needed anymore. Just like a traditional classroom never got replaced by elearning, blogs can't be replaced by 140-words of twitter or facebook updates.
What is happening already and is likely to happen at a much faster rate is:
Yes, perhaps it is true that blogging is growing at a far lesser rate than it was 10 years ago. But I don't think blogging is dying! The trends are changing. Our expectations as bloggers and readers are changing.
Since 2004, many Analysts have written about how social-media is just a fad and how twitter and facebook status messages will eventually take over blogging. If we were to believe reports, then in 2007 Gartner predicted that blogging will peak in 2008 and then it will fizzle out. But I don't think the fizzle is out just yet.
But here are some interesting statistics that provide another view:
Annual State of the Blogosphere 2009 report provided by Technorati states that:
- More than 133,000,000 blogs have been indexed by Technorati since 2002
- 86% of the respondents have been blogging for at least a year - 68% have been blogging for two years or more
- 57% say that their future plans include blogging even more (including 74% of 18-24 year olds)
- The most common rate of updating a blog is 2-3 times per week
- 900,000 is the average number of blog posts in a 24 hour period
Just like everything else in life, we want access to the latest and the most cutting-edge! But that does not indicate that we forget the old or that old is not needed anymore. Just like a traditional classroom never got replaced by elearning, blogs can't be replaced by 140-words of twitter or facebook updates.
What is happening already and is likely to happen at a much faster rate is:
- People will follow quality blogs that have something meaningful to discuss and stop reading things that don't matter. People are not as interested in posting or reading about minute-by-minute updates about personal lives.
- There will be significant advances in blogging technology that will give us applications and tools to create dynamic blogs that are more than just text. Syndication and aggregation of all 'content' will happen more seamlessly.
- Many more industry verticals will take to blogging - it won't be limited to the 'IT folks' or the politicians.
- Professional blogs and Corporate Blogging will continue to rise in the coming years. Companies will connect with their employees, investors, and customers more transparently through blogs.
- Blogs will continue to create clouds of meaningful social discussion. An inspired voice will continue to draw crowds of followers.
Wednesday, June 23, 2010
Culture-Neutral Instructional Design – Fact or Fiction?
As an instructional designer and learning specialist, I like to believe that I am aware of the cultural difference between me and my intended audience. I also believe that I try my best to ensure that my training design and developed content is devoid of any cultural bias and the instructions are unambiguous.
However, can instructional design ever be culture-neutral?
However, can instructional design ever be culture-neutral?
The Meaning of Culture
This statement is enough to let us know that the definition and understanding of culture is changing.
Culture can be defined as “the sum total of ways of living, including values, beliefs, aesthetic standards, linguistic expression, patterns of thinking, behavioural norms, and styles of communication” (Powell, 1997, p. 15).
The above statement clearly reflects that culture plays an important role in our daily lives. It is all pervasive yet not very obvious. The way we are and the way we perceive situations and react to them is a product of our culture. Culture is therefore learned behavior; it is not genetic.
The Need for Culturally-Neutral Learning
In the 21st century, all training and content providers and educational institutions want to ensure that they provide culturally-neutral learning environments. As more and more learning moves online, the audience has become global and widespread rather than local and captive. The boundaries separating cultural groups are now getting blurred. To be successful, training and content providers and educational institutions are sensitised to the impact of culture on learning.
Learning is a social phenomenon and it pervades culture. Learning is embedded in everyday situations. There is enough research to prove that learning is best achieved when it is used and applied in real-world contexts.
But as I am drawn to the paradigm – context (and not content) is king – I face these questions:
• How can I build the right context without incorporating the element of culture?
• Isn’t context culture-specific?
• Aren’t popular instructional design models themselves a product of a particular culture?
• How can I as an instructional designer be immune to the effects of culture – my culture and that of my learners?
Culture and Instructional Design
Culture not only affects how we behave and think but also how we learn. There is a growing recognition that learning strategies and tactics are influenced by culture.
According to Henderson (as cited in McLoughlin & Oliver, 2000), “Instructional design cannot and does not, exist outside of a consideration of culture”. Aspects such as the perceived role of the facilitator, usage of technology towards learning, type of assessment systems, more lectures versus more hands-on learning, various types of rewards of learning etc. are some of the factors that are deeply influenced by our culture. While we talk of inclusive design and culture-sensitive learning strategies; there isn’t enough or concrete research to help us design instruction that can help cross-cultural learners learn in ways that map to their culture, their values, beliefs and styles of learning.
Culture and learning both are evolving. There is not enough discussion about models that can help us design courses that are culturally-neutral. However, in my research, I came across one particular model proposed by Henderson. Henderson (1996) has argued that instructional design is about the creation of cultural identity and cannot be culturally neutral. Henderson proposed the multiple cultural model of instructional design. This model proposes a design approach that considers various cultural realities or zones of development. These include designing learning interventions that reflect multicultural ways of learning and teaching.
Application of Multiple Cultural Model on Instructional Design
Application of this model calls us for being culturally-sensitive and develop a global perspective about learning and teaching.
• Based on this model, we ought to adopt not one particular but multiple pedagogies that provide flexibility and a variety of learning approaches to learners based on their cultures and contexts.
• We should utilize learning and assessment strategies that can help minimize cultural misunderstandings between diverse audience groups.
• By using more constructivists’ approaches to learning, we can ensure that the learner is the centre of all learning and we offer increased flexibility and interactivity in all learning interventions.
• By becoming more aware of our own ‘implicit’ assumptions about culture and by appreciating the differences, we can design and develop learning interventions that are more culturally-sensitive.
So, can instructional design be culture-neutral? Perhaps not as much we would like it to be. But by adopting a more diverse view about learning and the differences in cultures, we can surely design and develop culturally-sensitive training that is more meaningful to our learners.
To begin the discussion, let’s probe a little about culture and what it means. The Wikipedia definition of culture says:
“Culture (from the Latin cultura stemming from colere, meaning "to cultivate") is a term that has different meanings.”
This statement is enough to let us know that the definition and understanding of culture is changing.
Culture can be defined as “the sum total of ways of living, including values, beliefs, aesthetic standards, linguistic expression, patterns of thinking, behavioural norms, and styles of communication” (Powell, 1997, p. 15).
The above statement clearly reflects that culture plays an important role in our daily lives. It is all pervasive yet not very obvious. The way we are and the way we perceive situations and react to them is a product of our culture. Culture is therefore learned behavior; it is not genetic.
The Need for Culturally-Neutral Learning
In the 21st century, all training and content providers and educational institutions want to ensure that they provide culturally-neutral learning environments. As more and more learning moves online, the audience has become global and widespread rather than local and captive. The boundaries separating cultural groups are now getting blurred. To be successful, training and content providers and educational institutions are sensitised to the impact of culture on learning.
Learning is a social phenomenon and it pervades culture. Learning is embedded in everyday situations. There is enough research to prove that learning is best achieved when it is used and applied in real-world contexts.
But as I am drawn to the paradigm – context (and not content) is king – I face these questions:
• How can I build the right context without incorporating the element of culture?
• Isn’t context culture-specific?
• Aren’t popular instructional design models themselves a product of a particular culture?
• How can I as an instructional designer be immune to the effects of culture – my culture and that of my learners?
Culture and Instructional Design
Culture not only affects how we behave and think but also how we learn. There is a growing recognition that learning strategies and tactics are influenced by culture.
According to Henderson (as cited in McLoughlin & Oliver, 2000), “Instructional design cannot and does not, exist outside of a consideration of culture”. Aspects such as the perceived role of the facilitator, usage of technology towards learning, type of assessment systems, more lectures versus more hands-on learning, various types of rewards of learning etc. are some of the factors that are deeply influenced by our culture. While we talk of inclusive design and culture-sensitive learning strategies; there isn’t enough or concrete research to help us design instruction that can help cross-cultural learners learn in ways that map to their culture, their values, beliefs and styles of learning.
Culture and learning both are evolving. There is not enough discussion about models that can help us design courses that are culturally-neutral. However, in my research, I came across one particular model proposed by Henderson. Henderson (1996) has argued that instructional design is about the creation of cultural identity and cannot be culturally neutral. Henderson proposed the multiple cultural model of instructional design. This model proposes a design approach that considers various cultural realities or zones of development. These include designing learning interventions that reflect multicultural ways of learning and teaching.
Application of Multiple Cultural Model on Instructional Design
• Based on this model, we ought to adopt not one particular but multiple pedagogies that provide flexibility and a variety of learning approaches to learners based on their cultures and contexts.
• We should utilize learning and assessment strategies that can help minimize cultural misunderstandings between diverse audience groups.
• By using more constructivists’ approaches to learning, we can ensure that the learner is the centre of all learning and we offer increased flexibility and interactivity in all learning interventions.
• By becoming more aware of our own ‘implicit’ assumptions about culture and by appreciating the differences, we can design and develop learning interventions that are more culturally-sensitive.
So, can instructional design be culture-neutral? Perhaps not as much we would like it to be. But by adopting a more diverse view about learning and the differences in cultures, we can surely design and develop culturally-sensitive training that is more meaningful to our learners.
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