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Here comes Chuck. He feels like he is just about complete with his analysis for his new instruction.
He’s has identified his goals, analyzed his learners, and completed an analysis of his environments.
Chuck has documented all of these things and he is anxious to begin the design phase
and write his performance objectives and his instructional strategy.
Chuck is raring and ready to go.
He’s not quite there yet.
He’s got a couple more things to do during the analysis phase.
He needs to classify his goals, and sequence the major steps of his goals.
Chuck also needs to map his goals to the types of learning he is trying to be successful with
and then he’ll need to diagram the steps of his goals.
Chuck really wants to jump into the design and probably has already done some of the design in his head.
It will behoove Chuck to take a little bit more time with the analysis of his goals.
If he does this analysis, it’s likely he will have a better design and will save some time and resource along the way.
What can Chuck do to complete the analysis of his goals?
Let’s take a look.
Chuck’s got his list of goals.
He’ll want to take those goals and classify them into the kind of learning that is going to occur.
During the analysis phase his major objective is to identify the skills and knowledge that will need to be included in the instruction.
At this point Chuck is going to identify the “major” steps that will occur and he’ll worry about some of the subtasks later.
A good start for Chuck might be to ask,
“What exactly will learners be doing if they accomplished this goal?”
He might have a little help with this via the subject matter expert.
Chuck might want to talk more with the subject matter expert to hone in on this particular thing since they “know”
and Chuck is going to auger in on the “do” part of the design.
Chuck can start by classifying the goals into the types of learning that will occur.
These types of learning are often referred to as the “domains of learning”.
What are the domains of learning?
Think of the things such as; “Verbal Information” or items where “stating”, “listing”, or “describing” information is involved.
There are also “Intellectual Skills” or skills where problem-solving is involved or forming concepts or applying rules may be involved.
There are “Psychomotor” skills or skills where the learner performs specific physical activities.
There are also “Attitude” skills where the learner makes “choices” or “decisions”.
And finally, there are “Cognitive Strategy” skills, which are skills that are used to “manage” our thinking.
Often cognitive strategy skills operate at a higher level.
So how does Chuck “map” these major steps?
Well, he has some experience with this already.
He remembers the taxonomy table tool that he learned about before.
Chuck can take the taxonomy table and begin to place his goals into the domains on the table.
This process will serve Chuck later when he tries to get back to his basic objective, which is to answer the question,
“What exactly will learners be doing if they accomplished this goal?”
Here’s what the taxonomy table looks like and how some goals may fit into it.
Chucks got his goals mapped into the appropriate domains.
It’s now a good time for him to start to diagram his instruction at the highest levels.
In order to do that he’ll want to get his goals into a simple statement that includes a verb that describes observable behavior.
Each of his steps should have an observable outcome.
As he begins his diagram he’ll want to use consistent symbols and arrows.
He’ll also want to depict “decision” points differently.
Some designers use diamonds to depict decision points in their diagrams.
When Chuck starts out, he may have a whole bunch of major steps.
It may take him some time to get his diagram down to a few major steps.
Generally speaking, two hours of instruction would likely use anywhere between five to fifteen major steps.
Chuck is going to continue to revise his diagram until he gets it in this five to fifteen step zone.
OK, Chuck is feeling pretty good now.
He’s got a manageable diagram with goals that have been classified into learning domains and a map that will serve him as he moves forward.
Chuck feels like his instructional analysis is pretty much complete now and he’ll be able to move forward into the design phase.
Instructional design is a fluid and iterative process so even though Chuck feels like he’s done with the analysis,
he may find later that he’ll need to come back and do more analysis.
That’s the “real” part of instructional design, the idea of continually revising goals, analysis, design, development, and evaluation.