Robert M. Gagné

Integrative Goals for Instructional Design.

Finding considerable agreement in their previous writings regarding the singular types of learning outcomes, the authors affirm a need to identify learning goals that require an integration of multiple objectives. The occurrence of multiple objectives is frequently encountered when instruction must reach beyond the individual topic or single lesson to the module, section, or course. It is proposed that such integration of objectives be conceived in terms of the pursuit of a comprehensive purpose in which the learner is engaged, called anenterprise. Given such an integrative goal of performance resulting from instruction, the various single objectives are viewed as being integrated as constituents of anenterprise schema. Three varieties of enterprise and their associated enterprise schemas are described, designated by their goals asdenoting, manifesting, anddiscovering. It is suggested that instructional design procedures include provisions for the learning of enterprise schemas when the integration of multiple objectives is required. Such schemas are also seen as playing a facilitating role in transfer of training.

Learnable aspects of problem solving

The educational aim of producing students who are good thinkers and problem solvers has been emphasized by educators for many years. More recently, the possibility of designing instruction to teach toward this objective has been recognized by investigators of human cognitive processes. Some varieties of human capabilities involved in problem solving, as revealed by previous evidence, arc identified and discussed. Particular attention is paid to cognitive strategies and their role in problem solving. An interpretation is given of problem‐solving investigations, pointing out (a) the task‐specific nature of most cognitive strategies involved in these studies, and (b) the apparent need to distinguish a more general “executive”; type of strategy. Alternative options of instruction for problem solving arc appraised.

Past and future research on learning hierarchies 1

Abstract Several areas of research on learning hierarchies are identified. It is proposed that the first of these, investigating the validity of hierarchies, should now be considered virtually at an end because of the increased support for hierarchies provided by the evidence of recent studies. A brief discussion is given of the few studies that have been performed in six other areas. General recommendations are made for future research on hierarchies, and some plans are suggested for specific investigations.

Characteristics of Media Selection Models

This paper identifies and evaluates the learning effectiveness of the major features found in media selection models. The 10 different models employed as examples are not described individually, as is done in some previous reviews. Instead, the article focuses on the characteristics noted across models. Features discussed include the physical forms the models take, the ways in which they classify media, and the media selection factors they consider. Selection factors embodied in models affect media choices. Characteristics of learners, setting, and task are identified as factors to be given primary consideration in media selection.

1: Learning and Instructional Sequence

Anyone who undertakes to bring about learning of a particular sort finds himself arranging a set of stimulus conditions that act upon the learner. In the simplest of cases, these stimuli may need to be made to occur only during a single brief period of time in order for the desired learning to take place. Far more frequently, however, the expected learning requires a stimulus situation that extends over a period ranging from seconds to minutes, even when one is dealing with a single learning objective. Since such durations are involved, the question of sequence naturally arises with respect to the arrangement of conditions for learning. What conditions need to occur first, what next, and what last in order for effective learning to be assured? The problem of arranging sequences of learning conditions, or, in other words, sequences of instruction, continues to be a topic of considerable importance for those who design and carry out instruction. In empirical research, the topic of this review has been capably addressed by several previous writers, sometimes in part and sometimes comprehensively. Interest in research related to instructional sequence continues to be reasonably high, and a substantial number of reports of empirical investigations has appeared from 1967 to the present.

THE LEARNING OF PRINCIPLES

Publisher Summary A principle is composed of two or more concepts having an ordered relationship to each other. A principle has been learned when it can be shown that a problem involving specific concepts can be solved by identifying these concepts correctly and placing them in the correctly ordered relationship with each other; in other words, by applying the rule. The principle is a capability that makes possible the demonstration of a sequence of behavior, each element of which may involve a concept. Learning of concepts is indistinguishable in a formal sense from learning principles. Principles are learned under conditions that have two major requirements: (1) the component concepts of which they are composed must be previously learned and readily recallable and (2) a communication, usually verbal, must be made to the learner indicating the correct sequence of these components. These two conditions of principle learning suggest a number of research questions that have as yet not received adequate answers.

Instructional Technology: The Research Field.

Two aspects of the context for research in instructional technology are described—innovations in media technology, and educational requirements. A good deal of education, the survival part, appears to be acquired byincidental learning, and a number of prospects are discussed for research in that area, while more traditional learning research onintentional learning is currently conducted in the framework of cognitive information processing. An important concept to denote what is learned is theschema, and a number of possibilities are described for schema-based research on learning from text.

Formative evaluation applied to a learning hierarchy

Abstract A formative evaluation method applicable to learning hierarchies is described which simplifies data collection by employing results from a posttest. Relations among pairs of lower and higher elements of a portion of a previously formulated hierarchy for graphic skills in kinematics were tested by means of data obtained from a posttest given to 148 secondary-school students. Results were compared with those previously obtained for the same hierarchy by a rigorous validation method. Correspondence of the two sets of results was high. Examination of test responses for discrepant instances yielded further information of value. Results additionally indicate hierarchical relationships to be the same in retention as they were for learning.

Observing the effects of learning 1

Abstract The effects of learning are typically observed in test situations, which need to be evaluated in terms of both construct and content validity. The model employed by information‐processing theories of learning and memory is proposed as a source of construct validity which provides a rationale for assessing the effects of several different phases of the learning‐memory process. As for content validity, the suggestion is made that criterion‐referenced measurement be achieved by precise analysis, description, and representation of the criterion through “job‐sample” testing, which would avoid the apparent narrowness of coverage of “domain‐referenced” item forms.

Some reflections on thinking skills

This paper and the three which follow it, by Dijkstra, Klauer and Tennyson, are based upon a 1987 symposium of the American Educational Research Association: Metalearning theories and instructional design. This paper discusses the other three papers by posing the question “Are there any thinking skills?”, then considering points that need to be taken into account in arriving at a reasonable answer to this question. It concludes “There is thinking, and there are skills. But-are there any thinking skills?”.