Week 8: Instructional Strategies for Procedures and Principles Learning

Week 8: Instructional Strategies for Procedures and Principles Learning

Procedures and Principles Learning are under Evaluation-Design-Development facets of the Instructional Design framework. (ADDIE)

According to Gagné (1985), procedure knowledge is “knowing how”. Another term for procedure is also "algorithm". For example, mathematics operations are procedures that are algorithmic. The ability to state the steps of a procedure is a declarative knowledge whereas the ability to execute a procedure is called productions, and intellectual skill.

There are simple and complex procedures. Simple procedures may be taught straightforwardly, with a step presented, demonstrated and then practiced.

Complex procedures, on the other hand, must be simplified for their inital instruction. Then later can it be elaborated into its more complex form.

The instructional events for learning procedures are:
• Learning to determine if the procedure is required
• Learning steps to complete the procedure
• Learning to list the steps in the prodcedure
• Learning to check the appropriateness of a completed procedure

In teaching procedures through E-learning , the most difficult Instructional events are feedback and practice.

However, ways in which we can circumvent the feedback problem is through online forums, wikis and even facebook groups (creation of facebook groups) to simulate discussion and which the learners can access in their own time and convenience. For practice, the problem can be solved through webquests, where the learner has to find his own resources from the internet to aid in his learning, and that can be a form of practice.

Principles are seen as a combination of rules, concepts and facts. It is considered a form of higher-level learning.
In contrast, principle learning can be described as “knowing why”. They can often be expressed in the form of “if-then” or “cause-effect” statements. Mental operations involved in applying principles are called "productions", which are implicit in all of the intellectual skills. Principles are characterized as variables, concepts, contexts, conditions, situations or conditions in which the principle is applicable and judgmental heuristics or “rules-of-thumb”.

The instructional events for learning principles are:
• State the principle.
• Recognizing situations in which the principle is applicable
• Applying the principle (aided through Variables, Factors, Illustrations or Explanation)
• Determining whether a principle has been correctly applied (through Practice and Feedback)