Foundation
Instructional Technology Definition
Instructional technology defined by AECT:
“Educational technology is the study and ethical practice of facilitating learning and improving performance by creating, using, and managing appropriate technological processes and resources.” (as cited by Reiser, 2012, P. 4)
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Instructional technology defined by scholars:
“The field of instructional design and technology encompasses the analysis of learning and performance problems, and the design, development, implementation, evaluation and management of instructional and non-instructional processes and resources intended to improve learning and performance in a variety of settings, particularly educational institutions and the workplace.” (Reiser & Dempsey, 2012, P. 4)
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My definition of Instructional technology:
IT is an field of study using technology to design the instruction and curriculum so as to motivate students and increase their interests of learning
Instructional T echnology History
1900-1920
1920-1930
School museums and instructional films were rudiment of instructional technology (Reiser, 2012)
Audiovisual instruction and radio acted as early instructional technology role. (Reiser, 2012)
1945-1955
During the World War II the use of audiovisuals and their devices grew fast and have been serviced in military extensively; also, instructional materials and researches were conducted in military training, which formed the origin of instructional media and design. (Reiser, 2012)
1960-1970
During this period, TV was invented and improved, which led to the development of television course.
1980-1990
2000-today
Computer was invented during this decade and buried the seed of computer instruction.
Internet and website changed our life entirely and provided the instructional technology a more widely developing space. In this space, lots of dreams have come to truth. The innovation of technology such as social media, online training, video conference, QR, google doc, google classroom and etc. facilitated the method and experiences of instructional design.
Instructional Technology Trends
In the future, individual study will be a trend in higher education. Instructional technology in this case will act as assistance of self learning. Virtual Reality could provide a new experience in the journey of learning.
Instructional Technology Scholars
1) David Merrill is one of the researchers who influenced the IT field greatly. He established Principle 1—Problem-centered theory stated that “Learning is promoted when learners are engaged in solving real-world problems.” (Merrill, 2002, Para1)
The Pebble in the pond approach proposed by Merrill is a content-centered Instructional Design. (Merrill, 2002)
Merrill prefers the term production oppose to the ADDIE models since development typically used ADDIE model. (Merrill, 2007)
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2) Robert M. Gagne was constantly worked on hierarchies of learning and created the hierarchical analysis process to identify subordinate skills. Both theories have significant impacts on instruction design. Besides, Gagne’s descriptions of five types of learning outcomes and nine events of instruction are two cornerstones of instructional design practices. (as cited by Resier, 2012, p.25)
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3) Benjamin Bloom proposed Bloom’s Taxonomy, which consist of six level of learning: knowledge, comprehension, application, analysis, synthesis and evaluation. The action verbs are frequently used in writing learning objectives for instructors (Bloom, 1956).
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4) John Keller is most known as his ARCS motivation model. The model consists of four main areas, Attention, Relevance, Confidence and Satisfaction (Pappas, 2015).
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Educational Theories
Three major psychological philosophies in the educational field are Behaviorism, Cognitivism and Constructivism. These three philosophies provide foundational guidelines and suggestions for instructional design field (Ertner & Newby, 2013).
Behaviorism was proposed by B. F. Skinner in the 1950’s. He believes that learning is based on the formation of behaviors. Teachers reinforce positively or negatively towards students’ behaviors, stimulate students discriminatively until they form behavioral patterns (Driscoll, 2012; Ediger, 2012).
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In the late 1970’s, with the creation of computers, Cognitivism emerged among different theories. Unlike “black box” that behaviorism treat human brains as, cognitivism scholars made some linkages with human brains and the computer information system. Researchers tried to explore the schema of human brains and figure out how the memory produce and process in our brains based on the computer operating principles (Driscoll, 2012). Gagne made big efforts on the cognitivism by integrating instruction design with cognitive learning process. He categorized learning outcomes by defining the types of capabilities of human learning; differentiated the internal and external conditions which lead to different outcomes; and proposed nine events of instruction aiming to facilitate learning process (Gagne, 1985; Driscoll, 2012).
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The two former theories share a common point that students learn from passively received knowledge or instruction provided by teachers. Constructivism combines cognitive with social interaction with others (Christensen, 2008). Teachers give students the right of exploring the outside world themselves, learning happens during this exploring process. Students in the constructivism approach play the master role in the learning process. Jean Piaget is one of the distinguished constructivists who contributed greatly for the generation of constructivism out of cognitivism and the four stages of children’s development (Brainerd, 1978; Ediger, 2012).
Reflections of ETEC 500
ETEC 500 is the foundation of the IT program. In this course we learned the definition, history and future trends of instructional technology. Acknowledged famous scholars in this field. Acquainted with APA style, the way of searching literatures in various resources and writing annotated bibliography. This course covered with the useful and interesting topics, which were the webhosting, HTML and e-portfolio. It also included a special activity which was the interviewing of an IT professional in this course. The most remarkable section during the class meeting was educational philosophis. All moduels were designed and arranged in consisted with the beginer of the program.
Professor conducted the class meetings based on constructivism teaching approach, which embeded discussion and video technologies to let us explore the outside world and gain the real life experiences. This is my favorate educational philosophy.
References
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Baek E., (2016). Basics of Annotated Bibliography
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Bloom, B., Engelhart, M., Furst, E., Hill, W., & Krathwohl, D. (1956). Taxonomy of educational objectives: The classification of
educational goals. Handbook I: Cognitive domain. New York: David McKay Company.
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​Brainerd, C. J. (1978). Piaget’s Theory of intelligence. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall, Inc.
Christensen, T. (2008). The role of the theory in instructional design: Some views of an ID practitioner. Performance Improvement, 47(4), 25-32. DOI: 10.1002/pfi.199
Driscoll, M. A. (2012). Theorie and models of learning and instruction. In R. A. Reiser & J. V. Dempsey (Eds.), Trends and issues in instructional design and technology (3rd ed., pp. 35-44). Boston, MA: Allyn & Bacon.
Ediger, M. (2012). Recent leaders in American education. College Student Journal, 46(1), 174-177. Retrieved from:
http://content.ebscohost.com/ContentServer.asp
T=P&P=AN&K=73951028&S=R&D=aph&EbscoContent=dGJyMNHX8kSeprE4wtvhOLCmr06eprBSsKe4SLaWxWXS&ContentCustomer=dGJyMOHp84vgset55%2BS5febl8YwA
Ertmer, P. A., & Newby, T. J. (2013). Behaviorism, cognitivism, constructivism: Comparing critical features from an instructional design perspective. Performance improvement quarterly, 26(2), 43-71. DOI: 10.1002/piq.21143
Gagne, R. M. (1985). The conditions of learning and theory of instruction. (4th ed.). Orlando, FL: Robert Woodburry.
https://www.basiccivilengineering.com/2016/05/mean-foundation-building.html
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Merrill, D. (2002). First Principle of Instruction, Educational Technology Research and Development, 50(3), 43-59,
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Paiz J. M., Angeli E., Wagner J., Lawrick E., Moore K., Anderson M., ... Keck R. (2015). General Format. Purdue online writing club. Retrieved from https://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/560/01/
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Pappas, C. (2015). Instructional design models and theories: Keller’s ARCS model of motivation. E-Learning Industry.
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Reiser, R. A. (2012). What field did you say you were In? Defining and naming our field. In R. A. Reiser & J. V. Dempsey
(Eds.), Trends and issues in instructional design and technology (3rd ed., pp. 1-7). Boston, MA: Allyn & Bacon.
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Stravarius. J., (2013). [Graph illustration the Timeline]. Capture, Create and Explore Ideas with Aeon Timeline. Retrieved from http://mac.appstorm.net/tag/timeline/
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