This has been an interesting and eye opening assignment. I did not expect to find so many different posts and websites which talked about Instruction design, eLearning, and the resources easily available to those who are instructional designers and those who want to go into the field of instructional design. Some of the sites provided lists of information about the most common Instructional or Learning Design Theories others discussed concepts or their experience and opinions about instructional design.
http://www.nwlink.com/~donclark/hrd/learning/development.html
This link will take you to a site which lists what it considers the seven most common Instructional Design Theories. I found the information that was provided interesting. I have had these learning theories presented and discussed in previous classes I have taken, however I wasn’t looking at them from the viewpoint of designing instruction as much as from the point of understanding how a person learned. This site also posted templates (analysis, lesson plan, presentation, and 3D power point] which I personally find useful when I’m working on something new and need an example to get a better understanding of the process. It’s interesting in these learning theories how some are referring to information by researchers from a couple of hundred years ago. Hard to believe how long this discussion has continued on learning.
http://timsladeblog.wordpress.com/2013/04/26/self-inflicted-scope-creep/
This blog was by Tim Slade who was presenting his observations on the concept of what he referred to as “self-inflicted scope creep”. When a plan creeps outside of its original form. He indicated this could occur when a planner first assumes there is more needed than what is really necessary. Secondly, when a planner is unable to let go of his ideas, no matter how good, this again adds unnecessary stuff. Thirdly, when the plan or outline is not followed and they end up off track. Fourth, when a planner is either over confident or insecure, this causes one to go above and beyond and results in being off track again. His tips to prevent this “scope creep”: First ask questions and listen to the answers. Secondly, decide if it’s really needed or just nice to have. Third, remember time is money in the business world, time on unnecessary work is not cost effective. Fourth, remember to keep things in perspective, to keep in mind your customer’s opinions count even if they don’t have a background which includes learning, training, instructional design experience or education.
http://christytucker.wordpress.com
Christy Tucker is an Instructional Designer who posts a variety of information on her site and welcomes questions and comments. She provides information through posts or multiple different website resources for different topics; for example information on portfolios, course on pipetting, models of interactive stories, Common Craft video on how to evaluate and review websites to find trustworthy information, Ways to troubleshoot Articulate publishing to the LMS, etc. Not only does she post websites for different topics, she also posts articles related to Instructional Design, e.g. revisiting learning styles, freelance work, working for higher education or in a corporate setting. She posts her comments/responses to what others may be saying about instructional designers.
I think her website could be a good resource for information or to get another opinion about an area of instructional design.
http://www.instructionaldesign.org/models/index.html
This website is titled Instructional Design Models – It lists the common prescriptive design models. If you click on a model it will give you a brief description of the model and additional places to go for further information. It is similar to the above mentioned site which listed the learning designs.
It would seem that how these designs are referred to [learning, prescriptive, instructional, theories] depends on who is discussing them.
speechtwister1949 