December 1997 — Features
Print this article | Email this articleClick here to receive your FREE subscription to T.H.E. Journal
Instructional Technology: Pedagogy for the Future
Often, more "flashy" IT media is targeted at younger learners whose metacognitive strengths lie in concrete thinking. The Internet, some conferencing applications, even Email are not for the concrete student. Conversely, the benefits of computer-based training (CBT) are quickly surpassed by more mature, abstract learners. Such misapplications can be costly, both in terms of money spent for ineffective lessons and opportunities missed in the teaching experience.
Summary. Perhaps in this paradigm lies some of the most fundamental strengths and weaknesses of IT. Teaching at an inappropriate level results in either frustration or boredom. Frustration occurs when the material is presented at too high a level of abstraction; a student cannot envision the concept being taught and is therefore confounded when attempting to apply the knowledge to concepts already acquired. Boredom, on the opposite scale, results when the material, best presented as abstract concepts, are instead handled as concrete ideas. Figure 6 shows the educator how to match the most effective application of instructional technology to address the mode of presentation that is most appropriate for the target learner.
Conclusions
Three different views of learning are matched to the most complimentary uses of technology in the classroom. And each paradigm proposes instructional technologies based on sound pedagogical principles.
l Teacher-centered classrooms are successfully paired with certain technologies; student-centered environments with still others. Paradigm Two opens windows on the most productive uses of ITs.
l Finally, teachers view learning from the perspective of the age of the student and a desire to teach not only facts and skills, but the very process of learning itself. Paradigm Three moves IT from the concrete to the abstract supporting a lifetime of learning.
Whatever degree of acceptance these paradigms may receive, a more critical examination of the why and how ITs are used can only help teachers promote success in the future use of instructional technology while avoiding the failures of the past.
The presentation of the theories and paradigms in this article is an evolving process. If you use your own paradigms for teaching that incorporate a different view of technology in the classroom, if you can identify other technologies that did not but should have appeared in these figures, or if you have a critique regarding the placement of these technologies within the paradigms, please email those comments to the author at
