Irene Visscher-Voerman

Paradigms in the Theory and Practice of Education and Training Design

Over the years, many authors have tried to describe, conceptualize, and visualize the instructional design or development processes via a variety of process models. Most descriptions imply a rather homogeneous view of design, depicting it as an overall problem-solving process following general phases such as analysis, design and development, implementation, and evaluation (ADDIE). However, researchers who have investigated how instructional designers actually work suggest that the process is much more heterogeneous and diverse than these ADDIE models suggest. This study collected case study data from 24 instructional designers in six different settings; they were identified as experts by their peers. The design processes they used for a specific project were compared to four different paradigms created from the literature. The four paradigms and their underlying theoretical foundations are described and illustrated. Detailed results are reported, and reasons that designers did or did not use a particular paradigm are considered.

Educational Design and Development: An Overview of Paradigms

This chapter will provide four different perspectives on educational design and development: instrumental, communicative, pragmatic, and artistic. The perspectives will be compared, and upon technical as well as social aspects of design will be their different views described. We will argue that designers should be aware of the usefulness of these perspectives and use the one that is most adequate for a certain design situation.

Multimedia Cases in Elementary Science Teacher Education: Design and Development of a Prototype

Multimedia cases intend to bring about fundamental changes in teacher education by bridging the gap between theory and practice. The use of information and communication technology in multimedia cases is expected to create a powerful and flexible learning environment. Such a learning environment is in line with a constructivist vision of teaching and learning. This paper focuses on the rationale behind case-based instruction by describing the design and development of a prototype and addressing the justification of underlying design decisions. Moreover, the prototype is briefly outlined and formative evaluation results are presented.

Curriculum Development from a Technical-Professional Perspective

‘Curriculum development’ refers to an intentional process or activity directed at (re)designing, developing and implementing curricular interventions in formal or corporate education. Studying this process will embrace at least three phenomena (Goodlad et al., 1979). The first is substantive and has to do with all everyday components of a curriculum (such as goals, subject matter, materials, etc.). The second is socio-political which involves all political and social processes that are involved in curriculum development processes. The third is technical-professional, referring to all processes through which curricula are actually designed, improved, and implemented in practice. In this paper we focus on the technical-professional perspective.

Educational Design and Development: A Study of Dutch Design Practices

This chapter will report some preliminary findings of a study on educational design and development practices in the Netherlands. The purpose of the study is to describe the strategies that professional education and training developers use in practice. Twenty-four developers were interviewed intensively and documents of their projects were analyzed. The data show that there are many differences between developers, but that there are also several common themes. This paper discusses the most important results in both the technical-professional and socio-professional domain, as well as the overall structuring of the process.