Nov
1
First Principles of Instructional Design: the recurring issue of knowledge vs. skill.
Filed Under Topics for debate | Leave a Comment
First Principles of Instructional Design:
the recurring issue of knowledge vs. skill.
Alexander J. Romiszowski.
(Educational Technology 46/6, November-December 2006, pp67-71)
Forward into the Breach? Or Back to First Principles?
The first of this series of “Topics for Debate” columns focused on the issues surrounding the promotion and assurance of Quality in Distance, Flexible and ICT-based Education. This topic was chosen as it was the theme of the then-forthcoming ICDE World Conference on Distance Education. The column raised some questions regarding such issues as whether technological or pedagogical advances were leading the quest for effectiveness, efficiency and quality improvements in the new e-learning forms of distance education. It questioned to what extent the quest for quality was different in the context of these new media, or whether there were some underlying basic principles that are equally valid in both distance and conventional learning contexts. It also questioned the long term sustainability of the trend towards collaborative group learning in online environments unless something is done to limit the extra workload this places on the teachers, the financial misconceptions that institutions tend to make about the real costs of effective e-learning systems, and some of the pedagogical misconceptions that are introduced by such catch-phrase terms as reusable learning objects, SCORM compliance, and blended learning.