I believe that people learn in a variety of ways. Some people are visual learners while others are auditory or tactical learners. Gardner’s Multiple Intelligences is a perfect example of this. Some learn best if the material is set to music. Some learn best by doing hands on activities while others still prefer to read. I feel that instructional designers should take into account as many learning styles as possible when designing instruction. If you include lecture, visual aids, a hands on manipulative and or some form of technology in your lesson most of the students will retain the knowledge from the instruction.
I personally like the Constructivism theory. I feel that learners learn best from guided instruction with a gradual transfer of the responsibility for learning from the teacher to the learner. I feel that it is necessary to make connections between the content and the real world. It is important to explain why you need to learn this. In the computer lab, fifth graders learn to type. Many of them were complaining one day because they did not feel that they needed to know how to type. We went into a discussion about what they were going to be when they grew up. For every occupation they came up with, I could identify some form of technology they needed. When they understood why I wanted them to learn it there were no more complaints.
I feel that a good instructional designer will use which ever theory will benefit the students the most according to their learning style.
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3 comments:
Yours is the second reference to Gardner's Multiple Intelligences that I've seen in the blogs and I agree with you 100 percent. I commented in the other person's blog that I wished I had more time to pursue this in the materials I design. Unfortunately, I'm often left to pursue the instructional style that will reach the greatest number of learners based on context, content, etc. and then relying on the trainers to reach those who need the personal touch of different learning styles.
I think it is really important for us at this point, to firm up our beliefs in learning styles, so that when we get caught up in the day-to-day grind, that we have our belief structure so secure that we automatically make sound decisions.
It is crucial that instructional designers create a learner-centered environment when creating instructional interventions. The intervention must be designed in such a way that learners can relate to it by making sense of the concepts using past experiences and previous knowledge. I'm a big fan of constructivism!
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