It is easy to assume that we all understand what learning is, but on reflection ‘learning’ can mean many things to different people. We take it for granted, as children, that we have to learn at school. But learning happens all around us, in various ways. When I was teaching, we would talk about the power of ‘yet’. When a child would say “I can’t do it” we would remind them that they just can’t do it ‘yet’! We were open with the children about how the brain works, how learning takes time to build bridges between knowledge and that we can’t always instantly do something. It is interesting that I have also needed reminders of this in my adult life when feeling frustrated learning something new.
This week, the readings have offered me a reminder of the three main features of instructional design (Behaviourism, Cognitivism, Constructivism) and their similarities and differences. Much of the time, I have believed that the approach to teaching depends greatly on the experiences of the learner as well as the type of learning being addressed, something that Ertmer and Newby (2013) also emphasize. Knowing our learners is important, but also not always possible depending on the circumstances and I am interested in how this can be addressed through an online teaching platform where there may be limited knowledge of the learners. On completing this particular reading, I’m reminded of the need to stay flexible and ensure that teaching is structured to allow for a clear and manageable progression.
Motivation theory is a topic that I have previously come across in my other classes and interests, and on reading Park (2018), it is clear that this is complex! The promotion of motivation, again, depends on knowledge of the learners and their reasons for their study. Often when teaching younger children, this seems to be an extrinsic force. Children often don’t get a choice about what they learn in the classroom (or certainly this is the case in my experience). The main message I gained from this reading is that continued engagement and positive motivation tend to come more from intrinsic reasons for the learning and this can be partially achieved by connecting learning to the real world, or to something of relevance for the learner. This is something that I’m keen to ensure is within my own resource design going forward.
Keller’s ARCS model has a clear process for ensuring a positive motivational design (Park, 2018) and I was glad to understand the process that they suggest for design. This is similar to others that I have come across before, in my readings on teaching young children programming skills. Sentance et al. (2019) advocate the PRIMM approach – Predict, Run, Investigate, Modify, Make – when sequencing activities during early programming learning. This links well with the ARCS model. To show this clearly I have created the following table:
| ARCS model | PRIMM model |
| Attention Gain learner’s interest and curiosity to ensure engagement for learning. | Predict / Run To gain the learner’s interest, to show what can be achieved through the learning. |
| Relevance Make tasks meaningful or relevant. Show the end-goal so learners can see what they are working towards. | Investigate Changing aspects of the programming, seeing what happens, exploring the effect of changing parts of the programming/code |
| Confidence Show learners that they can affect their performance, and that they can succeed. | Modify Modifying the code to make it ‘belong’ to the learner, increasing confidence by starting with some given code and adding or changing it. |
| Satisfaction Give a satisfactory outcome, achievement to gain intrinsic and extrinsic value. | Make Being able to create your own program using your own code – putting into practise what has been learned. Looking back at how far the learner has come in their knowledge. |
Parallels can be seen in the approach, and this is something for me to take into account going forwards.
I’m looking forward to learning about the approaches to assessment within learning design, as well as deciding on a subject and lesson to create with my group this week.
References:
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
Park, S. (2018). Motivation Theories and Instructional Design. In R. E. West (Ed.), Foundations of Learning and Instructional Design Technology. EdTech Books. https://edtechbooks.org/lidtfoundations/motivation_theories_and_instructional_design
Sentance, S., Waite, J., & Kallia, M. (2019). Teaching computer programming with PRIMM: a sociocultural perspective, Computer Science Education, 29:(2-3), 136-176, https://doi.org/10.1080/08993408.2019.1608781
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