A curriculum development methodology

For this post I am going to make a start on the Pedagogic Model. As a lecturer you are taught "Tell them what you are going to tell them, then tell them, then tell them what you just told them." This just means that a good lecture should have a beginning, a middle and an end. However, with distance learning or e-learning, at least some if not all of the immediacy that you get with a live presentation has to be replaced with static learning materials. The task of educational technology researchers has been to develop a model of human learning that can (a) occur outside of the traditional classroom; (b) be facilitated by the static resources. One big difference can be that courses designed around a sequence of lectures are period-based - divided up according to what can be learned in a fixed time period. By contrast, most distance learning courses are theme or topic-based and the learning is thus potentially self-paced. In practice, many technology subjects require the knowledge to be built up layer-upon-layer so the order of study comes out the same or similar whatever approach is used.

Just as software developers adopt a design methodology such as the Waterfall model (specify-design-implement-test) to produce programs, so curriculum developers use an instructional design methodology to produce lessons. One such scheme is known as ICARE.
[the original source is Hoffman, B., & Ritchie, D.C. (1998). Teaching and learning online: Tools, templates, and training. In: J. Willis, D. Willis, & J. Price (Eds.), Technology and teacher education annual – 1998.  Association for Advancement of Computing in Education - this article is not online I'm afraid; or try Evaluating Student and Faculty Satisfaction with a Pedagogical Framework, Vincent Salyers, Lorraine Carter, Penelope Barrett and Lynda Williams, The Journal of Distance Education / Revue de l'Éducation à Distance, Vol 24, No 3 (2010)].

The initials stand for the different components of each lesson so Introduction is self-explanatory whilst Connect is intended as a sort of brain-storming session where the learner(s) establish the context within which the study will occur. Then Apply stands for exercises and activities where learners practise and utilise their newly acquired knowledge and skills, and Reflect involves doing things that serve to integrate this new knowledge with prior knowledge. Finally, Extend suggests directions in which learners might like to expand their exploration of the topic. You will notice that all these items (apart from Introduction) are cast as activities that the learners engage in - the teacher doesn't really feature apart from initially setting/suggesting the learning tasks. This is a characteristic of constructivist learning models and I shall return to this issue in a subsequent post.

We used ICARE at Middlesex to develop an e-learning MSc in Business Information Technology. It was found that both students and our staff felt more comfortable when more control was placed in the hands of the teachers. So we added lecture notes to the materials in place on the Connect activities and called it Content so we could keep the acronym.
[Woodman, Mark and Milankovic-Atkinson, Maya and Sadler, Chris and Murphy, Alan (2001) From conventional to distance education: adopting a pedagogy and managing the transformation. In: Stephenson, John, (ed.) Teaching & learning online: pedagogies for new technologies. Kogan Page, London, pp. 120-128.]
In the end though Middlesex modified the model a bit more and came up with another acronym - SCATE
[see for example Enriching a pedagogical model for the implementation of a virtual training environment, Mimirinis, M.;   Dafoulas, G.A. ICALT2005. Fifth IEEE International Conference on Advanced Learning Technologies, Sept. 2005]
and this is still the recommended pedagogy for Middlesex-designed distance-learning courses.

In a forthcoming post I'll walk you through the pedagogic model implicit in the Mpirical LMS, but we'll need to return to constructivism first.