Designing instruction is not completely new to me. As an
educator, I designed instruction on a daily basis as I prepared lesson plans
each day. Fourteen years ago, I moved from the classroom into the Technology
Department as an Instructional Technologist with one of my main focuses on
training teachers on technology infusion. However, I never had put a name to
the process that I would go through as I designed these lessons/trainings.
In this instructional design course, I learned that the
process is called the ADDIE process. As I looked back over my previous attempts
at instructional design, I realized that I did basically go through these
steps. From surveys and observations, I was able to see where weaknesses
existed. From those findings, I would then begin to design and develop the
training. One thing that I did learn in this class is that the more planning
that goes into the design, the easier it is to develop the instruction. Taking
the analysis, building the goals and objectives, and developing the activities
are so closely related to each other that the more you include in the first two
areas, the easier the process is in the development stage. Another new idea
that was presented in the course was to list the needs of the participants and
the instructor. This is something I have never done before. I see how looking
at the needs of the participants can help guide the designer in the types of
activities to include.
From the evaluation, I learned several things. First, when I
had the client look over the job aid, she found a couple of areas that did not
make sense to her. Normally I am creating trainings where I am the instructor
as well. When creating for someone else, it is so important to be clear in all
of the instruction steps. Also, in looking at the feedback provided by the
participants, I found that they were all enlightened by the training. The main
concern was that they thought they needed more time on the activities in order
to fully develop the artifacts for each activity. After looking back over the
design, I could see that adding more time would be a good update to this module
for future trainings.
I believe that this process of designing instruction is
going to improve the quality of the trainings that I provide in the future. I
will pay closer attention to the details up front to ensure that the training
runs smoothly. I do not know that I will design instruction for others, but I
do know that I will provide numerous trainings each year for teachers as we
continue to build our one-to-one program in our district.
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