This week brought me to meeting with my client face to face instead of completing everything over the phone and via text messages. My client finally had time to meet with the rest of the her team and discuss the intended project and the scope and sequence of the entire course. After discussion some of them could not come to terms with some of the material (sig figs and dimensional analysis) becoming a zero unit, for fear students would not get the material, however after having taught chemistry for 10+ years, if done properly and knowing the students, I feel they could have done it, but hey I am just the instructional designer and not the client. The project therefore changes in scope, which in a way is better because I now am focusing on one topic of the module and not multiple. Having never used ADDIE formally, I find this no different than sitting down and planning for any unit that is going to be created, I guess the order is some what different. I feel it is important to have some guiding principle to follow, essential questions. In education I go with the thought of what do I want them to remember 4 days, 4 weeks, and 40 years from now. I know they are not going to remember all of the minutiae, but what is it they need to take away to have an intelligent discussion with someone. The goals and objectives will help me design for these essential questions.
Analysis and design go hand in hand, because if I don’t determine what materials you have available during the needs assessment, I might find myself in a situation where I design a fabulous activity only come to find out it is not possible to implement due to lack of resources. Resources take in any number of things such as the setting, funding, technology, and expertise to name a few. By formulating what may be designed during the analysis phase I can hope to create instruction that meet all of the needs of the client within the constrains of their resources. The whole design process is not linear but is more circular and will take on a spider web like appearance, because I am always going to have to go back to my analysis to make sure I am achieving the goals and objectives. I also find it important to keep analysis and design close together due to the abstractness of chemistry. My client wants to place emphasis on the non-linguistic representation of the subject matter. I need to keep this in mind to ensure that a) I have the resources to implement said task, but b) I incorporate this into all of the created resources and activities. Determining whether I create or curate resources is going to come down to do they have the non-linguistic representation of matter. Like was stated in Information R/Evolution, the possibilities are limitless and my created work can stifle learning.
Thoughts on Instructional Design 