The first was from Gustafson and Branch (1997). A loaded article, it was the taxonomy designed by Gustafson and Branch that really brought a smile to my face. Throughout the first three weeks of the course, I couldn't help but ponder about the time constraints in our profession. I agreed with and enjoyed many of the readings in the first three weeks, but couldn't helping asking myself, "who has time to do such intense lesson planning?"
The taxonomy set forth by Gustafson and Branch categorized instructional design based on implicit information the the design model. There were many pieces of information that resonated with me such as time of instruction, instructional designer experience and front end analysis. It was refreshing to read that as teachers we were not supposed to design a lesson to the same scale of that of someone which has the time and resources to design an entire course. In a day and age where our job is cluttered with PGP's, PFI's, CSI's, accreditation, powerschool, staff meetings, so many things that don't direct relate to student achievement, it was refreshing to hear that the expectation for instructional design in our classrooms was realistic.
 |
| Taxonomy of ID Models |
The second article by Mergel (1998) really summarized the implementation of instructional design and how it relates to learning theories. I have to admit, there was nothing particular that jumped out at me with this reading. I just liked how it talked about learning theories and ID models all at once.
When starting this course, one of the first things I did was try and find out what instructional design actually was. This concept of designing something so someone else could then design something seemed really odd to me. Why do I need someone else to explain to me how to explain something? Sounds odd, right? Well this article really summed everything up for me. By related the ideas of instructional design to learning theories, it really demonstrated to me the reason that we study instructional design.
Gustafson, K. L., Branch, R. M. (1997). Revisioning Models of Instructional Development.
Mergel, B. (1998). Instructional Design and Learning Theory. Retrieved from
http://www.usask.ca/education/coursework/802papers/mergel/brenda.htm
Mergel, B. (1998). Instructional Design and Learning Theory. Retrieved from
http://www.usask.ca/education/coursework/802papers/mergel/brenda.htm
