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33:
Learner-Control and Instructional Technologies
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33. 11 An Instructional Theory Of Learner Control?Can a comprehensive, integrative, deductive, prescriptive, and testable
theory of learner control be developed? I suspect not, not if we demand
of such a theory (any more than any other educational theory) that it
be falsifiable in the Popper (1968) sense. An alternative question, however,
is whether we can still develop instructional prescriptions for the use
of learner control which are at least pragmatic and are grounded in some
reasonable psychological and educational principles. I suspect we probably
can. In fact, work to develop such prescriptions can be found in many
of the existing learner-control reviews. Steinberg (1984), for example, lists a range of these events that might
be offered within a learner-controlled lesson, together with some conditions
that might mitigate their success: which topics to study and in what order,
number of exercises to practice and their level of difficulty, presentation
of review or supplementary materials, or the option not to answer questions.
Other activities, too, could be made optional: amount or kind of feedback
to see following practice questions, whether to exit the instruction,
mode of presentation (e.g., verbal or graphic), and even the option of
whether to allow further learner control at all. Laurillard (1987) presents another assortment of computer-based learning
strategies of which learners might judiciously be given control. One category
of these strategies, control of content sequence, includes provisions
for the student to skip forward or backward a chosen amount or to retrace
a route through the material, and options to control when to view such
features as content indexes or content maps. [A rather remarkable early
example of learner control of content sequence in computer-based instruction
comes from Grubb (1968). He describes a system whereby the student, with
the aid of a light pen and a content map on the screen, is able to point
and jump to any subtopic in the lesson. This approach presages the current
"hypertext" environments in which students proceed through instruction
in a nonlinear "browsing" fashion.] Another category presented by Laurillard (1987) is called control of
learning activities, and includes options for the student to see examples,
do exercises, receive information, consult a glossary, ask for more explanation,
and take a quiz. Most of her list of learner-controlled activities is
included in Steinberg's (1984) list, but Laurillard's seems more complete
and grounded in educational-psychological theory. Milheirn and Martin (1991) discuss when and how to prescribe three types
of variables for which students might be granted control: control of pacing,
that is, the speed of presentation of instructional materials; and control
of content, permitting students to skip over certain instructional units.
They suggest that these categories, in addition to control of sequence
(similar to Lautillard's control of content sequence), represent the most
germane sets of instructional variables affecting the success or failure
of learner-controlled CBI. Recently others, most notably Chung and Reigeluth (1992), have worked
to synthesize an empirically based and pragmatic listing of instructional
prescriptions that link a variety of learner-control strategies (over
content, sequence, pace, display/strategy, internal processing, and use
of advisor systems) to instructional conditions (learner characteristics,
learning objectives or domains, and instructional systems) and broad outcomes
(learning achievement, transfer, and retention, time efficiency, cost
efficiency, and attitudes toward learning and instruction). These authors
recognize the multidimensional nature of learner control, and provide
a helpful set of do's and don'ts for deciding when to employ which learner-controlled
instructional events. Their recommendations are many, and only a few are
presented here as illustrations of their approach. For example, they recommend that students should be offered control of
content when they have significant previous knowledge in the content area,
because presentation of already known material could be irrelevant and
interesting. If students are already prepared with some content knowledge,
they can more effectively manage their own content. Additionally, content
control might be given when the learning objectives are of a higher-order
type, as opposed to factual information. Similarly, they list conditions that allow for learner control of sequence,
such as when the instructional program is quite lengthy (sequence control
can help maintain learner motivation and interest), or when they are familiar
with a topic. Likewise, students should not be given control over sequence
when learning objectives have a clear prerequisite order, or when it would
be impractical to break up and resequence existing materials. In a similar vein, they provide many conditions for using learner control
of specific instructional elements such as pacing, displaying information
or using instructional strategies, internal processing (including some
metacognition strategies), and use of advisory systems. To justify many
of these prescriptions, Chung and Reigeluth (1992) cite empirical studies
from the learner-control literature; many others, however, are derived
from current instructional theories (e.g., Gagn6, 1985; Merrill, 1983)
and need empirical validation in their own right. Given the overall structure
they give to their instructional prescriptions, essentially a series of
"if-then" conditions, it would be interesting to see developed
a type of computer-based decision tree or expert system based on the "mix
and match" combinations of instructional strategies, outcomes, and
conditions presented in their paper. Such a prescriptive system of learner
control might then be validated with research across a variety of instructional
systems and contexts, and would provide some tests of the generalizability
of their recommendations. All of the categorization schemes providing advice on if, how, and when
to use learner control in CBI overlap to a large degree and differ primarily
in perspective or orientation. And all provide useful information for
designers attempting to decide whether and how to include learner-controlled
events in their instructional designs. None, however, is comprehensive
or definitive. |
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