Instructional Design Models

How do they compare?

When we discuss instructional design models, we are referring to setting up curriculum that best serves our students. As there are many types of students with varied learning styles, as well as schools with varied demographics, and teachers with preferred paradigms, it behooves us to compare elements of instructional design to evaluate and plan curriculum in our own lesson plans.

Gagne’s Nine Events is a design model for teaching and learning that aligns with constructionist and bilingual education pedagogy, my focus framework for teaching English language learners.  Where Gagne’s Nine Events includes the following nine elements, the chart below provides a three way comparison of those elements with constructionist and bilingual education pedagogy:

Gagne’s Nine Events	Constructivism	Bilingual Education
Attention	Leading questions, presenting a problem or dilemma	Simple, creative questions of familiar content with support of L1
Objective	Student-centered with practical use	Comprehensible goal
Prior Knowledge	Surveys of individuals and small groups; small group discussion to assess prior knowledge	Ask questions in L1; incorporate elements of L1 language and culture in questions
New content	Identify attributes; provide examples with compare and contrast exercises; provide familiar examples	Scaffold concepts slowly with simple language in L2; affirm that students understand before transitioning to new concepts
Guidance	Foster concept discrimination; use concept maps to teach; use worked examples	Present concepts in order of simple to complex; check for understanding
Performance	Students create anchor charts; concepts practiced in participatory tasks	Students use authentic conversations with scripts, write personal stories, create original posters with images and words of content knowledge using L1 when necessary
Feedback	Peer editing; IEP’s to promote student directed themes for future study; consistent one-on-one conferencing	Translation of concepts not clear to the student; support of L1 as student’s work is critiqued
Assessment	Project based formative assessments; include students’ research findings	Use of L1 in formative portfolio; assess in role-play for oral proficiency; autobiographies, short questionnaires, authentic writing tasks
Retention and transfer	Technology:  Facebook page, texting, emails, reviews in alternate modalities; have students create PowerPoint and podcast presentations	Provide student additional practice lessons for repeat language applications; Technology using interactive language programs, Facebook, texting, emails, Voki, podcasts

Each of these three instructional design frameworks provides a similar student-centered perspective.  What the teacher might find most challenging following any framework is the fluidity by which lessons and assessments are presented. We as instructors know we must include motivation, essential questions, and presentation of content, appropriate practice lessons, feedback, and application for retention of the content learned. The way in which we serve our students with those elements are contingent upon our program’s required documentation, (Best Literacy Exam given every 60 hours of attendance, for example), and the demographics of our students:  Which students are English language learners? Which students struggle with reading and/or math? Which students may be developmentally delayed due to disruptive home lives? A framework provides the ideal format for including necessary elements of a successful teaching and learning experience.

How does the use of technology expand our lessons?

Objectives can include the use of cell phones, the internet, and radio and television, providing the instructor a choice of a flipped or traditional classroom activity. Prior knowledge can be accessed with use of the internet: (students can research their home countries or ancestors’ home countries and talk to their families).  Content can be presented in numerous interactive online programs that promote language learning as well as content knowledge acquisition. Guidance can be offered in the form of emails, and google docs, and wikis for collaborative discussion. Performance opportunities are expanded with students creating Voki, PowerPoint, videos, podcasts, blogs, and protected Facebook pages. Feedback and assessment can be prefaced with discussion and explanation of the value of the assessment, with word document comments, return emails, and posted rubrics on Blackboard.

Retention transfer can be in the form of project-based tasks where students use the content knowledge to share with other students:  creating their own Facebook page, or webpage, or class online newspaper.  By using the content in a sharing collaborative, students remain engaged and able to retain new information in authentic communication. 

Students' and Teachers' Moving Ideas

Students and Teachers Moving and Creating ideas

Using different technologies in the classroom can enhance student learning. Hillbrook School in Los Gatos, California, launched a prototype in adaptive and agile learning spaces. Furniture, whiteboards, and technology can be moved at the teachers’ or students’ discretion to facilitate the lesson being learned that day.  The space is large with possible room dividers, and the design is endless in its configuration.

The response from students as well as teachers was overwhelmingly positive.  Teachers made comments after using the space called ILAB, or Idea Lab, of “Students are more interactive.  The facility provides room to create and think. The room can be adapted to the lesson. I love the energy.  The kids are engaged. Sixty percent more of the students were involved in discussion and participation. “Students commented, “I feel more free to do something I want to do.  It’s a crazy room for crazy ideas. You can sit in a corner or talk with everybody.”

                Teachers and students use this room for project-based, participatory learning.  Learning is student directed as they are presented a project or question or problem to solve, and they are asked to do the work themselves in researching the subject and finding a way to solve or create an answer.  Each student is provided an iPad for internet access. Inventions, science projects, mathematical designs, and engineering concepts were presented. As the company who designed this concept and sells the furniture modules states, it is truly a learning environment of “exploring, experimenting, and experiencing”.  Bretford Manufacturing produced the mobile furniture. Peter Lippman is an architect who writes about collaborative spaces and architectural design influencing our students’ learning.  It seems like an amazing venture into successful integration of innovative use of technology and physical space to enhance learning. 

                What is the cost?

                First, the tuition at Hillbrook School is $29,000 a year per student. I will let you breathe a moment.  Obviously this type of innovation can be costly at any school, but Hillbrook appears to have the means as it is a private tuition-based institution.

                Can we as instructors in central Illinois implement some of these resources?  Yes, of course we can!

                We can move our classroom furniture in creative ways to allow our students more free space for thinking, imagining, discussing, and solving problems. We can use technology in computer labs as tools to assist our students to work through project-based learning activities that inspire them to explore and be innovative.  We can provide more formative assessments that allow our students to direct their learning and practice and apply information they have learned.  We can allow them more autonomy as they read, discuss, view, respond, evaluate, and create.   

               

 Hillbrook School iLab

Barriers and Possible Pathways to Effective Technology Instruction

            Pat Reid writes in “Barriers to Adoption of Instructional Technologies” that we can minimize barriers to give adoption of technology a better chance in our schools.  Current literature discusses those barriers of “administration, environment, faculty, technology, and process” (Reid, page 383) with varied experience and significance, depending on the school being assessed. With the understanding that all schools have unique dynamics, funding, and structure, it may be helpful to see one school’s response to these barriers.

Illinois Central College addresses “barriers” of technology adoption in the following ways:

1.       Administration:  From the Academic Quality Improvement Program:   “INSTITUTIONAL CONTEXT AND COMMITMENT The College has provided for the faculty an instructional technology specialist, a graphic technician, a faculty Teaching and Learning Center, and the Office of Instructional Innovation and Faculty Development that serves all faculty––both full-time and adjunct.”    This means to me that I am fully supported as an instructor with technical experts in their fields who established a department to serve the staff and students at ICC.  ICC is committed to growth in technology education for their students and staff.

2.      Environment:  Each institute has a culture that guides how technologies are adopted. (Reid, page 394) Some challenges that arise in the school environment regarding technology education are tensions between administration and faculty, legal issues, and effectiveness of technology instruction.  Illinois Central College has established a “Blue Print for the Future” that was written in collaboration with students, staff, and administrators. This “meeting of the minds” insures that all stakeholders have a voice in the integration of technology in the curriculum.  Legal issues are also addressed by the Teaching and Learning Center and Office of Instructional Innovation.  The college itself has developed an associate degree in Secure Software, where students learn the legal ramifications of software issues, as well as protecting systems from hacking and compromised functionality.

3.      Faculty: Instructors are often enthusiastic to embrace new technology tools.  The challenge is 1) choosing the appropriate type to augment instruction of specific lessons that support student learning, and 2) knowing how to use the new technology with sufficient expertise to teach it to students.  Professional development for instructors is widely needed. Then the question arises as to funding, and instructing qualified teachers, with the time and space necessary for providing this instruction. How do schools pay for professional development of teaching digital literacy, and provide special personnel who support existing teachers in their endeavors to use technology in their lessons?  According to the Office of Educational Technology in the Federal Department of Education, Title II-A funds can be used to hire technology advisors within a school. (ESEA, sec. 2123(a)(5)(A).  Blended professional learning can be provided by Title I-A funds. (ESEA, secs. 1114(a)(1), (b)(1)(D); 1115(a), (c)(1)(F).   College to Career educators can use TitleII-A funds for sharing content aligned with CCR standards. English language learners can receive enhanced instruction through funds provided by ESEA, secs. 3115. Technology to Communicate with Parents States may use IDEA Part D State Professional Development Grants (SPDG) to enhance both special education and general education teachers’ ability to effectively integrate technology to communicate with parents of students with disabilities. IDEA, sec. 654(a)(2)(C). Use Technology to Connect Educators with STEM Professionals States may use Title II-B Math Science Partnership funds to purchase software and devices that provide digital science instruction.

4.      Technology and Process:  Many programs available to instructors and students were not originally designed for classroom use, according to Hastings, 2009. The limitations and complexity can cause confusion. (Reid, page 386) Instructors also struggle to assess which technologies best fit their students’ learning benchmarks. Some instructors feel that this process takes an inordinate amount of time and effort, and may question the value of the technology tool added to their lesson plan.

What ICC has provided the teachers is technology instruction within the Teaching and Learning Center, as well as a program called Atomic Learning, available on Blackboard, to assist the teachers as they integrate technology in their lessons and classrooms. Each semester the Teaching and Learning Center offers a series of weekly posts on technology tools to enhance instruction. A new technology tool is introduced on Tuesday of each week. Technology seminars are also offered; “14 tools to flip over”, and “Student Assignment Alternatives” and “Google Apps and Tools” were offered this year so far.  Office 365 is available to staff and students with online guidance. The Faronics Insight Software is available in some classrooms where the instructor can see the work of the students as they study on individual computers. The Atomic Learning software is available to students and staff for Microsoft software tutoring. 

Because of the support ICC gives me, I am able to incorporate technology in my ESL lessons.  I had been unable to use digital instruction when I taught offsite at other locations, simply because I did not have the support or equipment. I believe this element alone is integral to our self-efficacy as technology users and teachers. 

Sources:

Barriers to technology in the classroom

Funds to provide professional development digital literacy