chapter 6

Chapter 6 was about writing performance objectives. What stood out to me from this chapter is that there are a lot of things to do to write a good performance objective! What I particularly thought was interesting was when it told about specifying objective conditions. As a teacher, I probably need to think more about the conditions for learning that are taking place in my classroom. In particular, the authenticity of the performance context. Sometimes I think that 4th grade is too basic for the assessments to be authentic, but I want to try harder to think of some assessments that I can make more authentic to real life outside of school.

Analyzing learners/Chapter 5

This chapter was easy to understand for me because these are things that I do all the time as I teach 4th grade, although not as in-depth. I am constantly evaluating what the students do and don't know, and adjusting the instruction to fit needs. One thing that came to mind while reading this is a topic that comes up a lot in our school meetings. It is, focusing on what is within our circle of influence. Our school has a large at-risk population and that is sometimes frustrating. We realized that we can't control things like what the parents do, socioeconomic factors, etc. We also can't control how the media/legislature sees us, new policies that are rolled out, etc. These fall within our circle of concern.  But, we focus on what we can control- such as classroom environment, quality of instruction/instructional strategies, etc., and this is what will help us to reach our goals Really, the whole ID process will help your focus on the circle of influence rather than the circle of concern.
 

Analyzing learners and contexts/ch5

will update later

Task analysis/chapter 4

Chapter 4- Identifying Subordinate and Entry skills
Brown- Conducting Task Analysis, Essentials of Instructional Design

I really enjoyed these chapters and found them to be very informative. Task analysis is the most important part of the instructional design process and forms the basis for the instruction that is being created. I liked how the book talked about different ways that subordinate and entry skills can be identified, but it also mentioned that entry skills are very tentative. I've found this to be a great challenge in my 4th-grade classroom as I have so many students on different levels, particularly in math and reading. It's hard to really ever know where they all are at, and know how to instruct the group as a whole. Modifying instruction is a lot easier said than done! To me, the different models of task analysis were all very similar, and would get you to a similar goal with any that you decided to folllow.

Chapter 3 and readings

Chapter 3 Conducting a goal analysis.
Conducting a goal analysis consists of classifying your goal into one of the 4 domains and then identifying the major steps that learners must go through to achieve the goal. I like the focus that was put on the steps of the process of achieving the goal. It's so important to keep in mind the subskills that are required to reach a goal. I think that considering these subskills will help me more in my teaching, especially in subjects like math which is more linear. This week I found myself teaching basic borrowing in subtraction, a skill my students should have learned years ago, while the subject matter was subtracting numbers up to the hundred thousand's. Many hadn't mastered that subskill or had forgotten so I had to go over that again, which I didn't realize would need to be done until I found many kids consistently missing that skill in their practice. Another thing that I appreciated that in this chapter was that goals were broken into 4 kinds- verbal skills, intellectual skills, psychomotor skills, and attitudes. Perhaps a lot of the goals I have include two or more of these kinds of skills together and I should consider separating them so that my goals are more clear and simple.

Shiffrin- "Instructional systems design- five views of the field"
The main point of this article is to say that ISD is a field that is widely misunderstood. This is because it is very complex. It stressed that it requires Educational theory and research knowledge, systems analysis, diffusion, consulting and interpersonal relations, evaluation and assessment, and project analysis, among other skills. I liked how the article said that there are many names thrown around for programs that teach similar things and we need some standardization. I know that as I have been telling many of my fellow teachers what program they are doing, they assume I'm either writing code and doing things with computers, or learning about curriculum. It's a lot different than that! Both of those skills would be helpful in ISD but there is just more to it!

Chapter 2 and readings

 I think that the thing I appreciated most about these readings was that the focus is on having a clearly identified goal. "...the most critical event in the instructional design process is identifying the instructional goal... Without accurate goals, designers run the risk of planning instructional solutions for which needs do not really exist." (p. 15). Having a specific goal changes the whole process of designing instruction. It focuses it and helps the designer be able tor design the best, most effective instruction possible. The part about clarity in instructional goals and "fuzzy goals" (p. 26) stood out to me a lot, as well as the following section "Learners, context, and tools" (p. 26-27). A goal statement should have descriptions of the learners, what they should do, the performance context, and tools available.  

 In teacher trainings, we usually call the goals "objectives" but the idea is the same. Something that is always stressed in those trainings is that teachers should state and post the objectives for our lessons. I have a spot on my front white board where I post my objectives. It is a teaching practice that has helped me a lot as I plan and also as I am teaching, to stay focused on the goal. It is also helpful for students to know what the goal is and that they are expected to work toward accomplishing it. 

Week 2

In class we were shown a lot of different models for instructional design.

I liked the ADDIE model best. I like that evaluation is in the center of it. I feel like evaluation is a driving force in creating instruction. If you are not constantly evaluating what you are doing, how will you create something good?

Analysis
Development
Design
Implementation
Evaluation

Does instruction help with motivation? It can. If there is high engagement, that usually leads to higher motivation.

Systems approach-- requires that all instructional processes be viewed as interrelated parts of a whole system, to be analyzed, designed, and developed in a coordinated and interdependent process.
Beneficial because it focuses on what learners do and links all the parts together carefully.

1. Technology is value free (it does not make things faster or our lives easier)
2. The application of technological solutions to one problem may create other problems which may be more serious than the original problems.
3. Applications of technology should be selected and/or continued only after determining that desirable consequences outweigh undesirable consequences

Conclusions: I am excited to learn and apply the ADDIE model because I think it is a good system. It makes sense and is a good framework for instructional design because it focuses on an objective. Objectives are so important because if we don't have an objective, what are we even doing? We need that focus in our teaching. Also, I like ADDIE because it focuses on evaluation during the design process.