E-learning: The Science of Instruction Ruth Colvin Clark and Richard E Mayer

1. E-learning: The Science of InstructionRuth Colvin Clark and Richard E Mayer Today we’ll cover: Chapter 1: e-learning: promise and pitfalls Chapter 2: How people learn from e-courses Plus digressions for additional related materials on instructional methods

2. The e-Learning Bandwagon • 90% of universities have distance learning • Does this include Lehigh? • U of Phoenix, Athabasca U, etc., entirely online • $50-60 billion/year spent on corporate and governmental training (as of 2003) • 11% delivered by computer in 2001 • Verizon’s Virtual University hosts most technical training • U.S. Army partners with PricewaterhouseCoopers • What is a knowledge-based economy? • Is e-learning a key to knowledge-based economy?

3. What is e-learning? • Instruction delivered via computer • Content relevant to learning objectives • Uses instructional methods such as examples and practice • Builds new knowledge and skills

4. Media + instructional methods • Media elements present and illustrate content • Text, audio narration, music, graphics, animation and video • E.g., Dreamweaver course uses audio narration and animated graphics • Instructional techniques support learning • Examples, practice exercises, feedback • E.g., Dreamweaver lesson uses simulation practice • Why might simulating an actual work environment be particularly effective?

5. When to use e-Learning (from Margaret Driscoll, Web-Based Training) • Cognitive skills: solving problems, applying rules, distinguishing items • E.g., how to complete tax forms • Psychomotor skills: coordination physical movement and thought • E.g., driving a golf ball or driving a crane • Require coaching and detailed feedback • Attitudinal skills: opinions and behaviors • E.g., whether to recycle • Which is hardest to teach with multimedia?

6. Which skills are most suitable for e-learning? • CPR training? • Developing a sort algorithm? • Supporting a political party? • Driving a stick shift? • Finding and using Photoshop plug-ins? • Trouble-shooting printer problems?

7. The Art of Changing the Brain(James E. Zull) • The Learning Cycle: Sense → Integrate → Act • Learning originates with concrete sensory experience • Reflective observation integrates inputs in patterns and develops generalizations or abstract hypotheses • Active learning tests the results of motor output

8. Three theories of learning • Receptive: information acquisition • Learning adds information to memory • Instruction delivers information efficiently • Directive: response strengthening • Strengthen stimulus-response associations • Drill-and-practice with reinforcing feedback • Guided discovery: knowledge construction • Learner builds a mental representation • Guide learner in the context of solving problems • Is one theory right? Or a combination?

9. Types of e-Learning goals • Inform: build awareness, e.g., about a company’s organization • Perform: build skills, e.g., how to use software or how to evaluate bank loans • Procedural: step-by step tasks • Near transfer from training to application • Learning Dreamweaver may involve near transfer? Why?Give an example. • Principle-based: guidelines and problem-solving skills • Far transfer from training to application • Why does learning how to evaluate bank loans far transfer?

10. How do people learn? • Two information processing channels: • visual and auditory, each with limited capacity (attention) • Working memory has limited capacity: • 7 chunks plus or minus 2 • Learning occurs by active processing • From working to long-term memory • Rehearsal encodes knowledge • Knowledge must be retrieved from memory • Retrieval brings knowledge back into working memory

11. Pitfalls of e-Learning • Failure to do job or skill analysis • Presenting skills and knowledge out of job context risks transfer failure • How could this pitfall affect your project? • Failure to accommodate human learning • Multimedia can actually depress learning if it overwhelms limits of human processing • Attrition: e-Learning dropouts at least 35% • Games and stories may detract from learning Why?

12. Do these techniques aid human learning? If so, why? • Using an arrow or color to draw the eye to important information? • Listing learning objectives up front? • Omitting background music? • Using succinct text? • Ask about trouble-shooting actions relevant to job context?

13. e-Learning Research • Informal studies: observing people as they learn or asking them about it • Formative evaluation makes changes from learner feedback • Summative evaluation reports results to sponsors & others • Formal studies use experimental research design, with subjects randomly assigned to test and control groups • Controlled: compare outcomes of 2 or more groups of learners • Clinical trials: evaluate e-learning in real world contexts • Should show statistical significance (p<.05) • Book uses results of controlled studies that suggest basic design principles for e-learning • Why is experimental basis useful?

14. Design dilemma(Clark & Mayer, e-Learning, chapter 3, pp. 52-53) • VP thinks a short course should just consist of text and tells course designer: • “Everything they need to know is in the text. All they have to do is read it. And we don’t have much time!” • How should the course designer react? • “Do you mind if I come up with something that builds on your text?”

15. The Multimedia Principle • Include both words and graphics • Why? • Graphics facilitate active learning, mentally making connection between pictorial and verbal representations • Words alone may cause shallow learning

16. Two kinds of pictures • Decorative vs. explanative illustrations • What’s the difference? • Decorative pictures are eye candy • Explanative illustrations help learner understand the material • Instructional designer’s job is to enable learner to make sense of information

17. Match graphics to content • Illustrate procedures with screen captures • Show a process flow with arrows or animated graphics • Organize topics by using rollover buttons to show different graphics

18. Psychology of multimedia • Information delivery theory: learning consists of acquiring information • Information format shouldn’t matter • Cognitive theory: learning is actively making sense of information • Active learning involves constructing and connecting visual and verbal representations of material

19. Evidence for multimedia effect • Ten lessons teaching scientific or mechanical processes, such as how pumps work • Students who receive multimedia lesson perform better on post-test than students who receive same information in words • Improvement of 55-121% more correct solutions to transfer problems • Similar results in experiments with CIMEL