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The Future of Instructional Materials: From Grotto to Virtual Security to the Writing Process

Jonathan Bacon
Academic Director, Educational Technology Center
Johnson County Community College

This paper was presented at "Creating Futures" the Fall Conference of the Consortium of College and University Media Centers, October 18-22, 1996 at the Embassy Suites- Plaza, Kansas City, MO.

Introduction

Technology is transforming the manner in which instructional materials are developed and delivered. Multimedia, interactive media, CD-ROM-based products, and the Internet continue to chip away at the traditional paper and ink as well as the traditional chalk and chalkboard approach to content delivery. The future of instructional materials appears to be in bits and bytes as opposed to reprocessed wood pulp. The wave of technological advances is sweeping over most colleges and universities while we attempt to ride the crest with mission statements, goals and objectives that honor the advance of technology.

Johnson County Community College, where I serve as Director of the Educational Technology Center adopted a Vision, Values, Mission, and Strategic Objectives document that includes seventeen strategic objectives for 1996-97. Of the seventeen objectives, seven fall under a "mission component" described as "Incorporating diverse instructional methods and current technology in the teaching and learning process."

These seven strategic objects include phrases like "provide the technology on campus necessary to enable students to acquire the competencies needed to satisfy educational goals," "enhance computing capabilities," "provide the technology needed for students, campus visitors, and the community-at-large to...access college information," "provide education and training for faculty and staff to maximize the...investment in technology," "meet the need for off-campus learning experiences and develop...electronic course delivery strategies...to remove time and place as constraints on access to educational opportunity," "support the design, development, and the application of technology to enhance teaching and learning."

Like many of your institutions, we are involved in the headlong rush to adopt and adapt to the new ubiquitous and appealing technologies:

that challenge the way in which we deliver instruction,
that shrink the world in which we live,
that mushroom the information and data that we must absorb and apply, and
that strike fear into the souls of all men and women who serve as technology specialists.

Despite our pursuit of leading edge, cutting edge, and bleeding edge technology, let us not jump off the ledge until we address important issues related to the future of instructional materials. Let us chart our path based on an examination of issues rather than the current technological frenzy. It is important to ask:

What is the test of effective instructional materials?

Why should we teach digitally when we still have an investment in chalk, chalkboards, overhead transparencies, paper, and ink?
How did we get from multimedia to Internet-based delivery?
Who will prepare the instructional materials of the future?

What Is the Test of Effective Instructional Materials?

Instruction is the development, delivery, and transference of information through specific learning activities. In less theoretical terms, instruction is the teacher lecturing and interacting, the coach rehearsing and reviewing, the mentor guiding and counseling, and the tutor directing and correcting.

Technology is only another tool that can be applied to improving instruction. It does not mitigate but rather increases the important role of instructional design. Instructional design is the framework within which we focus our developmental energies on the planning and delivery of learning activities such as lecturing, interacting, coaching, guiding, directing, and correcting.

Effective instruction must:

move the learner toward defined learning objectives,
convey information, and
transfer skills (from carpentry to critical thinking).

Whether developing traditional or technologically enhanced learning activities, effective instructional design:

advocates for the learner,
is effective, efficient, and appealing,
provides consistency between learning objectives, learning activities, and assessment,
requires identification of the instructional outcomes, and
requires preparation and planning.

Why Should We Teach Digitally When We Still Have an Investment in Chalk, Chalkboards, Overhead Transparencies, Paper, and Ink?

There is no compelling reason to use technology in the learning process unless the end product enhances the learning experience of the learner. During an October, 1992 Boston meeting of the Directors of the IBM Technology Transfer Centers, we developed a list of reasons why multimedia can enhance learning.

Note: Though the focus at that time was on multimedia, we have now think in terms of interactive media that includes both Web-based, networked, and stand-alone computer-based instructional materials. The reasons for using multimedia apply to all forms of digitized instructional materials.

Based on input from faculty and instructional technologists, it is clear that interactive media can be effective in the learning process when it:

Meets the instructional needs of students,
Provides for learning activities that appeal to students with diverse learning styles,
Maintains the interest of learners with short attention spans,
Helps put "fun" back into learning,
Focuses learning activities on conceptualization in addition to the acquisition of specific skills,
Uses simulations to enhance the communication of information ("A picture is worth 10,000 words"),
Helps encourage a positive attitude toward computers and technology by students who have little or no exposure to personal computing,
Takes advantage of the positive attitude toward using computers by students who have previous computing experience, and
Invigorates the instructor who accepts the development of computing skills as a new challenge.

How Did We Get from Multimedia to Internet-based Delivery?

In the late 1980s, Johnson County Community College recognized that multimedia was an additional tool to be added to the instructor's repertoire. Multimedia (also called media integration by some technologists) includes the combined use of several media (text, graphics, sound, video, animation, and interactivity) in a single computer coordinated presentation. From the beginning, my college recognized that the "integration of multimedia technology into the...curriculum is aimed at improving instruction and addressing the varied learning styles of students." Once the college decided to proceed with the development of integrated media, a new question arose: Who will prepare instructional multimedia?

We have adhered to a philosophy that most instructional multimedia should be created by the instructor whose first hand knowledge of the learners' needs is unsurpassed. As we planned for the preparation of instructional materials at Johnson County Community College, we identified four groups of multimedia developers and consumers:

Faculty as Programmers: Back in the late 1980s, we recognized that a small portion of the multimedia development effort would be handled by faculty members who chose to develop programming expertise and serve as both content experts and developers for their own projects. We anticipated that faculty programmers would choose to develop projects using products like ToolBook, SuperCard, Hypercard, or Authorware. The decision was made to let these faculty "forge ahead at their own pace" and that the Educational Technology Center would provide limited support. We anticipated that due to the rigors of learning and using an authoring program, this group would be self-motivated and willing to invest considerable time in programming and related training. We expected that less than 10% of our faculty would fall in this category. Of necessity and by self-selection, faculty programmers would be the most computer literate faculty on-campus. They would be our bleeding edge scouts and pioneers. As anticipated, this group remained small.

Faculty as Presenters: During fiscal year 1993, the college focused most of our training and development efforts on bringing multimedia to the "masses." We sought to prepare members of the faculty to become self-sufficient using a classroom multimedia presentation tool. Training was provided by the Educational Technology Center to assist faculty to create multimedia-based classroom presentations. As part of the process, after a series of faculty forums, the College adopted Microsoft PowerPoint as the classroom presentation standard in January 1993. Within two years over 260 full-time faculty and staff were trained to use the product. Materials developed ranged from electronic substitutes for traditional overhead transparencies and classroom handouts to simulations and hypermedia glossaries of important terms and concepts.

This approach reached the widest group of our faculty. The average faculty member was able to create instructional materials that professionally presented the content deemed important by the instructor. I won't bore you with the problems we encountered, such as insufficient budget to properly equip all classrooms and the deficiencies of portable multimedia workstations. Our effort was rewarded by the development of a body of faculty who forged ahead despite frustrations to use technology to impact instruction.

Faculty as Content Experts: With the drafting of the Strategic Plan for Introducing Instructional Multimedia to Johnson County Community College 1993-1995, the college recognized that the remainder of the multimedia development effort would be a collaborative effort between members of the Educational Technology Center (then called the Academic Computing Technologies Group) and individual faculty members. The faculty would serve as content experts for their own projects while the Educational Technology Center staff would serve as designers, developers, and programmers. Because these projects are human resource intensive, the college required an application process where the faculty member would define the learning objectives, audience, and justification for the project. It was anticipated that 4-5 projects of this type would be developed each year. That number was overly optimistic.

Students as Multimedia Consumers: Back in those pre-Internet days, we pegged students as the consumers of multimedia. At that time our strategic plan stated "Whether creating computer assisted instruction (CAI) modules, tutorials, training modules, or classroom presentations using multimedia tools, students will be the primary targets and users of computer coordinated multimedia in the curriculum." We anticipated that "all instructional spaces (classrooms, labs, and the library) [must] contain the means to distribute multimedia courseware" and that the "possibility of distributing multimedia courseware via campus-wide networks must be explored."

We looked forward to the day when:

The campus would be networked so that multimedia could be easily distributed,
Faculty multimedia developers who feel comfortable enough to pass development skills on to students, and
Multimedia would be created by students for use by students.

The Response: We found that faculty adopted and used PowerPoint for handouts, tutorials, classroom presentations, student orientations, and conference presentations. The Educational Technology Center in cooperation with faculty content experts developed interactive media modules on World Humanities (Giotto, Parthenon, Florence), Fine Arts (How to Read a Painting and Pictorial Forces), Administration of Justice (Virtual Security), and Student Services (the Career Planning Process and New Student Orientation).

As anticipated, a small group of faculty did develop and use new programming skills to create classroom and tutorial materials using Astound, Authorware, Digital Chisel, Hypercard, Macromedia Director, Special Delivery, SuperCard, and Visual Basic. However, the number of faculty wanting to create interactive modules (beyond what could be developed using PowerPoint) increased dramatically. The variety of tools in use became too great for the Educational Technology Center to support. During the 1994-95 academic year an attempt was made to define an interactive, easy to use, cross-platform authoring tool. An acceptable product could not be found to meet all the stated criterion. While the unsuccessful search continued, the computing world at JCCC changed dramatically.

Internet access for JCCC faculty and staff began to arrive in the Fall of 1994. It took time for everyone to get "connected" because at the same time, a new fiber optic backbone and campus-wide network was required and installed. Faster than the network could be constructed, faculty were attracted to the Internet (and specifically the World-Wide Web) as a vehicle for the delivery of instructional materials. Web access and the introduction of Web authoring solved several lingering issues including the need for:

Cross-platform compatibility so that a single set of tools could be used to create and access instructional materials for both Windows and Mac OS users.

An easy to use authoring tool that minimized the need for programming skills and (preferably) built upon existing faculty skills with office automation tools (word processing, database management, and so on)
Easy access to developed materials by students on both campus platforms (Windows and Mac OS).
Faculty acceptance of the authoring tools and the methods of distribution for the instructional materials created.

By the Fall of 1995, most faculty were connected to the Internet and many were seeking assistance with HyperText Markup Language (HTML) authoring. Over Spring Break 1996, the Educational Technology Center offered the first of several Web Wizard Workshops to assist faculty with authoring their own Web documents. The handouts for the workshop can be viewed at: www.jccc.net/acad/etc/?webwiz

The workshop has been revised twice and has been used to successfully train close to 90 JCCC faculty (from almost every program area) and staff (from the Library, the Public Information Office, Purchasing, and Word Production). By exploring our Web site, you can observe that the workshop includes the basics of HTML authoring, working with images, adding plug-ins to Netscape, adding flair to your Web pages (using animated GIFs, Java applets, PowerPoint presentations, and Shockwave), designing instructional materials for the Web, plus creating animation and Shockwave movies using Director.

Basic HTML authoring has become our "PowerPoint" for the Web and our interactive development tool for classroom and instructional materials.

Who Will Prepare the Instructional Materials of the Future?

Just as desktop publishing freed the individual to create newsletters, flyers, and brochures; the Web has enfranchised a global community of users who are free to explore their own creativity in publishing. For faculty, HTML authoring can parallel the simplicity of using a word processor -- though it can also include the complexity found in a formal programming language. The publishing future of instructional materials is now in the hands of faculty, staff, and students.

The future of instructional materials can be forecast, by examining the present. For instance:

The range of options for preparing and presenting instructional materials has increased not narrowed because of technology.
Commercial and institutional publishers of educational materials face greater competition (primarily from self-publishers like faculty) but for-profit publishers will not disappear. Publishers will continue to develop off-the-shelf materials that include supplemental CD-ROMs and Web pages to support their hard copy publications.
Faculty will use off-the-shelf instructional materials when useful, but they'll also self publish when the available instructional materials do not reflect their instructional objectives or their instructional style.
Access to data will not be the problem. Individuals, students, publishers, educators, businesses, and governments will promulgate information at a rapid and expanding rate. The real challenge will be packaging. Available information must be packaged into focused instructional materials that meet instructional objectives through appropriate learning activities.

How Will Digitized Instructional Materials Be Used to Assist Learners?

For the astute instructor, digitized instructional materials will be used as they successfully enable the learner to encounter and retain important concepts and skills. Examples of common formats include:

Using simulations and background information that prepares learners for real life experiences.

Dr. Jim Jackson, an instructor at JCCC, worked with the Educational Technology Center to develop the Nelson Project. The integrated media project is used to prepare students to visit the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art in Kansas City. While acknowledging numerous ways to view a work of art, the project focuses on examining the stories or motifs behind three works of art created by separate artists over a thousand year period. Each work is based on a motif from classical mythology.

Using simulations so students can encounter virtual experiences that can not easily be duplicated.

Simulations can be a safe method of providing students with virtual experiences that cannot be safely duplicated such as working with hazardous materials, experiencing the meltdown of a nuclear reactor, and participating in the surgical exploration of the human anatomy.

Even while using this type of simulation, the educator must grapple with the issue of whether a virtual experience ever replaces the real, hands-on experience. Further, are there specific concepts and skills that should only be delivered in real verses virtual mode? Some examples of courses that include elements that may not be appropriate for virtual presentation include courses in sign language, interpersonal communications, and speech.

Using digitized media to bring material to the learner that is otherwise inaccessible.

Working with Dr. Jackson, the Center developed a projected called Giotto and the Arena Chapel to expose students to art objects that explain the Judeo-Christian tradition. It is one of several interactive media modules that are now distributed by Harcourt Brace and supplement the World Humanities course offered at JCCC. In this case, we sought to provide students with a virtual experience that cannot be easily replicated; that is, viewing the work of Giotto and his Arena Chapel in Padua, Italy. Additional modules in the series include a visual history and examination of the Parthenon and Filippo Brunelleschi's Florence.

Using technology to enable learners to be teachers who can learn by teaching.

A fascinating aspect of HTML authoring is that it gives students the license to be authors, compilers, editors, artists, and publishers of electronic media. From the home schools of Alaska (http://www.teelfamily.com) to the History of Opera students at Rhodes College in Memphis, Tennessee (gray.music.rhodes.edu/musichtmls/RigolettoProj.html) to the JCCC Technical Writing students of Dr. Steve Gerson (www.jccc.net/~sgerson/sample.htm) and available on the Internet.

Using the Internet as an expansive resource library

Perhaps the easiest and the most prominent use of digitized instructional materials is in the area of reference works. Working with Dr. Gay Young in the JCCC Administration of Justice Program, the Educational Technology Center developed a Virtual Security Web site (www.jccc.net/acad/etc/vs/vsaa.htm). The site is designed to guide students and the general public when assessing homes and businesses for security risks. Dr. Young plans to eventually add practice problems to the site where students can virtually conduct a security check (using zooming images, VRML, or animation) and then report back (to the instructor) any possible security risks.

Provide course content so instructors can focus on interaction with students rather than delivery of basic content.

Dr. Bill Lamb, the academic director for the Writing, Literature, and Media Communications program at JCCC, plans to offer a distance learning version of Composition I (our Freshmen English course). We are working with Dr. Lamb to create a series of Web pages called The Writing Process that focus on each of the writing assignments in the course. The first module, recreating a personal experience, is currently under construction (www.johnco.cc.ks.us/acad/writing/). The project will enable students to use personal storytelling as the vehicle for exploring the writing process and identifying major and minor grammatical errors.