20. Cognitive Teaching Models

Brent G. Wilson

University of Colorado at Denver

Peggy Cole

Arapahoe Community College

20.1 Cognitive teaching models

Educational psychology and instructional design (ID) have had a long and fruitful relationship (Dick, 1987; Merrill, Kowallis & Wilson, 1981). Educational psychologists like Gagne and Glaser have always shown an interest in issues of design (Gagne, 1968; Glaser, 1976); indeed, they helped establish instructional design as a field of study (see 18.3) (Gagne, 1987; Lumsdaine & Glaser, 1960). In recent years, a growing number of cognitive psychologists have shown a renewed interest in design issues and have tested out their ideas by developing prototype teaching models. These teaching models differ from most educational innovations in that they are well grounded in cognitive learning theory. Examples include John Anderson's intelligent tutors (Anderson, 1987) and Brown and Palincsar's reciprocal teaching method for teaching reading (for a research review, see Rosenshine & Meister, 1994). Wilson and Cole (1991) reviewed a number of these prototype teaching models and related them to current ID theory. This chapter continues that agenda by reviewing a number of additional teaching models and drawing implications for the design of instruction.

Specifically, the purpose of the chapter is to:

1. Argue that the development and validation of teaching models is a legitimate research method and has been an important vehicle for advancing knowledge in learning and instruction.
2. Show how the development of cognitive teaching models compares to the development of traditional ID theory.
3. Review a number of cognitive teaching models, and discuss a few in detail.
4. Look for insights from these cognitive teaching models that relate to instructional design.
5. Identify issues for future research.

20.1.1 Instructional Psychology and Design: An Historical Overview

To provide a context for interpreting the chapter, consider the historical overview provided in Table 20-1.

The field of instructional design developed in the 1960s and early 1970s at a time when behaviorism still dominated mainstream psychology. ID shared those behaviorist roots and at the time was closer to mainstream psychology. ID theorists such as Gagne, Briggs, Merrill, and Scandura all were educational psychologists. With the cognitive revolution of the 1970s, instructional psychology differentiated itself from ID and drifted more to the cognitive mainstream, leaving ID relatively isolated with concerns of design. In a review of instructional psychology in 1981, Lauren Resnick (who only a few years earlier had developed Gagne-style learning hierarchies) observed:

An interesting thing has happened to instructional psychology. It has become part of the mainstream of research on human cognition, learning, and development. For about 20 years the number of psychologists devoting attention to instructionally relevant questions has been gradually increasing. In the past 5 years this increase has accelerated so that it is now difficult to draw a clear line between instructional psychology and the main body of basic research on complex cognitive processes. Instructional psychology is no longer basic psychology applied to education. It is fundamental research on the processes of instruction and learning (Resnick, 198 1, p. 660).

In her review, Resnick acknowledged that mainstream instructional psychologists had focused on issues of performance modeling and cognitive task analysis, neglecting the challenge of devising effective instructional strategies, models, and interventions. Even so, she did not look to the I D community to fill the need because "Instructional design theory ... , which is directly concerned with prescribing interventions, has developed withou much reference to cognitive psychology" (Resnick, 198 1, p. 693). Hence, she excluded ID theory entirely from her review. Of course, the ID community was active during this time, with even some attempt at integrating cognitive psychology into their methods (e.g., Low, 1981; Merrill, Wilson & Kelety, 1981; Merrill, Kowallis & Wilson, 1981)-Resnick and other mainstream psychologists just weren't reading them! This polarization between ID and psychology continued through the 1980s. In spite of efforts to move ID into the cognitive mainstream, psychologists and designers continued to move in different circles and speak somewhat different languages (see 5.5). Psychologists viewed designers with suspicion because of the eclectic and ad hoc nature of the ID theory base and because of the field's concern for stimulus design over cognitive processes. Likewise, the ID literature often ignored developments in cognitive theory, resulting in theory that was generally divorced from state-of-the-art learning theory (e.g., Reigeluth, 1983, 1987).

Only recently, with the vigorous dialogue on constructivism and situated learning, have psychologists and designers resumed a substantive conversation (Duffy & Jonassen, 1992; Educational Technology, Apr. 1993 special issue on situated learning; Wilson, 1995). Psychologists such as Bransford, Perkins, Scardamalia, and Lesgold, who have taken on the challenge of design, have run up against many of the same problems addressed by traditional ID theories. At the same time, the perspectives of psychologists have stimulated reflection and renewal within the ID community. The net result of this interplay is a renewed recognition of the importance of design, as well as an array of new designs that take into account new technologies and theories of learning.

20.1.2 The Role of Teaching Models in Research

Like other scientists, instructional psychologists develop theories and models describing the world, then use accepted methods of inquiry to test and revise those theories. Examples of appropriate research methods include controlled experiments in laboratory settings as well as ethnographic and qualitative studies in field settings. Another legitimate method of testing out concepts and strategies is to develop a prototype teaching model and assess its overall effectiveness in different settings. A teaching model incorporates a complex array of learning/instructional factors into a single working system. For example, John Anderson tested out his ideas of procedural learning by developing intelligent tutoring systems (see 19.4) in LISP programming, geometry, and algebra (Anderson, 1987; Lewis, Milson & Anderson, 1988). Ann Brown and her colleagues (Brown, Campione & Day, 1981; Brown & Palincsar, 1989) developed reciprocal teaching as a means of testing their research-based findings in metacognition.

The development and tryout of practical teaching models would not normally come to mind as a method of "research," yet surely such design and implementation efforts yield important new knowledge about the viability of cognitive theories and models. Perhaps such practical projects could be termed inquiry even if they do not fit the traditional connotation of research. When researchers become interested in the problem of how people learn complex subject matters in realistic learning settings, practical tryout of programs and methods fills a role that no amount of theorizing or isolated-factor research can provide.

Teaching models can derive from direct empirical observation. Collins and Stevens (1982, 1983) closely observed teachers who used a Socratic dialogue approach and, based on the observed patterns, developed an instructional framework for inquiry teaching. Duffy (1995) developed a hypermedia tool to help preservice teachers to select relevant instructional strategies. The tool displays real-life segments of master teachers' lessons, then offers critiques from a number of perspectives, including those of the observed teachers. It also provides an electronic notepad for each preservice teacher to reflect on strategies used in the teaching episodes. While one could argue that Duffy's work is merely a neutral tool for displaying observed teaching performances, the tool embodies an underlying teaching model that is heavily grounded in actual teaching performances (see 7.3.3, 7.4.1). Such "bottom-up" approaches can complement the heavy influence of "top-down" learning theory as a basis for the design of teaching models.

In summary, the development of teaching models constitutes a unique combination of theory construction and empirical testing. Theoretical abstractions must be carried to a new level of specificity as they become instantiated into an effective teaching program. At the same time, promising theory must be tested against the demands of real-world settings. Thus the development and testing of teaching models helps triangulate findings from more traditional research methods and ensures a relevance to the practice of teaching.

In the review of models below, we have purposefully selected a range of models to illustrate the diversity found in the instructional psychology literature. We conclude with a discussion of goals and methods for instruction aimed at bringing some order to the diversity.