whos the boss?

[Guest guest]

This is an interesting discussion of the need to consult with at

least three different type of experts in designing courses. For our

purposes, this would suggest teachers and course designers should

consider the opinions of scholars, recent grads, other teachers and

longtime clinicians in formulating their ideas. Relying heavily on

one or the other has shortcomings (see below). Perhaps this will

help resolve some of the conflict on this point. Another point made

in this article and this model in general is the desirability of

problem based learning, but not the pure openended model often called

PBL in med schools. This model stresses the role of mid level

experts specialized in knowledge transmission (sometimes called

teachers) to assess information gleaned from scholars and clinicians

and recent grads to provide completed examples and construct

standardardized process methodologies for students. This has been

shown to reduce cognitive load and result in better learning that

just asking students to try and discover these methodologies on their

own through inquiry and searching. It is certainly the only way to

ever produce any inter-rater reliability.

 

Rather than just completely construct their own unique idiosyncratic

understanding of established bodies of knowledge (which could be

called MSU here), students instead focus on constructing mental

models that are rooted in the expert community. In all fields, this

still provides a lot of wiggle room for new ideas and personal

interpretations, but it is didferent than anything goes. This

article also suggests that the experiences of longtime practitioners

are not to be dismissed no matter how unscholarly or didactgically

unhelpfull they may seem at first glance. This also points out the

unique role of trained teachers and designers in this process.

Teachers don't need to be scholars or fulltime clinicians. They need

to be experts in education. Teachers rely on scholars and clinicians

to provide the raw data that they convey. Unfortunately, too many

teachers feel the need to portray themselves as the subject matter

experts in all cases, as well. However, there can only be few

leading experts in any field and those are the folks who spent all

their timeon either scholarship or practice. Teachers need to focus

on what leads to desired educational outcomes.

 

Sorry, its not available online for free.

 

AUTHOR:Rob J. Nadolski; Paul A. Kirschner; Jeroen J.G. van

Merrienboer; Hons E.K. Hummel

TITLE:A Model for Optimizing Step Size of Learning Tasks in

Competency-based Multimedia Practicals

SOURCE:Educational Technology Research and Development 49 no3 87-103

2001

 

Three different categories of experts are used for the different

analyses. The first category is practitioners in the problem domain

with a lot of experience (in our case lawyers with more than 10 years

of experience; the nestors). The second category is practitioners

who are new in the domain, but who function as trainers in this

domain (in our case fairly recent graduates who are practicing their

profession; the trainers). The final category is teachers who are

used to teaching in the problem domain, but who no longer practice

(the teachers). Roth and Woods (1989) indicated that the choice of

experts is a potential area of bias in a cognitive task analysis. We

try to avoid this bias by using a reasonable number of experts with

different backgrounds. They provide input for various analyses

through standardized interviews that are analyzed by instructional

designers. In their analyses they look for consensus while identifying

(reasons for) observed differences.

 

A cognitive task analysis identifies a domain-specific problem-

solving strategy [known as an SAP or Standard Approach to Problem

solving] together with its associated heuristics. [author: Domain

specific means it is standard in a given field, not some general

model of problem solving.] Trainers play a key role in identifying

this SAP since they themselves, as beginning practitioners, are not

far removed from the target

population. Their SAPs, acquired through think-aloud protocols, can

with relatively small changes be used for Instructional Design purposes.

 

Nestors internalize, automate, or shorten their SAPs to such an

extent that they leave out many steps, making it almost impossible to

use them for instructional purposes. Practicing law is quite

different from learning to practice law (see also Kirschner, 1991,

for an example in the

domain of the natural sciences). Trainers have not yet internalized,

automated, or shortened their SAPs to the level that nestors have.

 

A second problem with using the SAPs provided by experts (Kirschner,

1991) is that the way experts work in their domain

(epistemology) is not equivalent to the way one learns in that area

(pedagogy). A similar line of reasoning is followed by Dehoney

(1995), who reasons that the mental models and strategies of experts

have been developed through the slow process of accumulating

experience in their domain areas. It is therefore not clear what

happens if these models and strategies are imposed on learners. They

may interfere in as yet unknown ways with the process of acquiring

expertise.

 

Dehoney (1995, p. 120), however, proposed that " some lower-level

cognitive strategies can be taught. For example, experts' domain

specific strategies for planning and reflecting on the problem

solving process will emerge from a cognitive task analysis. These can

be taught to novices through modeling. " In our view, providing a

domain-specific strategy in problem solving through a process

worksheet supports the process of acquiring expertise, because this

is an example of such a domain-specific planning strategy.

 

 

 

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