Reports heuristic observations on how to conduct effective instructional development at the college level. Based on a 2-year study of instructional development at four major universities, the 18 heuristics listed cover objectives, software development, student involvement, relations with faculty, use of models, and management cautions. (BK)

Describes how to use collaborative groups as a teaching strategy in a 200 student introductory astronomy class for nonscience majors. Presents a brief rationale for this approach then describes the implementation process and lessons learned. Emphasizes practical information most useful for faculty starting to include collaborative group activities…

Noting South Africa's emphasis on program-organized learning in higher education, and based on experiences in the Academic Planning Unit at the University of the Western Cape, discusses the role of faculties in program development and offers suggestions concerning the reengineering of faculties for collaboration across disciplinary and…

Discussion of procedures for selecting appropriate media in instructional development projects highlights a study that examined media selection decisions of instructional development graduate students under intuitive and model-directed decision-making conditions. Use of the Reiser-Gagne media selection flowchart is described, and implications for…

Describes the NETwork for Excellent Teaching, an instructional development program at Indiana University-Purdue University at Indianapolis (IUPUI) that uses a performance technology approach. NET program goals and representative projects are described; and goal achievement is evaluated through administrative acceptance, student learning, and…

Study represents evolving research on service-learning and the ability of the Community Service Involvement Preference Inventory (CSIPI) to measure how students prefer to become involved in community service. Results suggest that the CSIPI may lend itself to advancing empirical arguments for transforming service from an extracurricular activity to…

Addresses the question of what constitutes a writing course. Maintains that the main objective of a writing course is the development of the writer, and that the privileged text is students' writing. Takes issue with writing courses that emphasize reading, subject content, or investigation over the writing process. (TB)

Lessons learned from developing a web-based course on client education in health care were as follows: faculty, instructional designers, and technology staff must collaborate; pedagogy, not technology, drives delivery; student interaction is critical; faculty role changes online; feedback must improve course design; and resources must be…

The convergence of mobile technologies into student-centered learning environments requires academic institutions to design new and more effective learning, teaching, and user experience strategies. In this article we share results from an mLearning design experiment and analysis from a student survey conducted at the National College of Ireland.…

The role of contemplative practice in adult education has a long history if one includes traditional monastic education in Asia and the West. Its use in American higher education is, however, more recent and more limited. Nonetheless, on the basis of evidence from surveys and conferences, a significant community of teachers exists at all levels of…

This paper focuses on the development of the Learning Activity Package (LAP). The first part of the paper discusses the structure of the LAP, including its components (i.e., title, rationale, objectives, content, learning activities, student review, post-evaluation, pretest, alternate activities, management directions, and teacher supplement) and…

Ten individuals in the Educational Technology Program at the University of Northern Colorado served as subjects for this study, which was designed to: (1) identify cognitive networks of concepts within components of a system design model for expert and novice instructional developers, and (2) determine cognitive networks of concepts between…

This chapter presents two significant gaming concepts, one old and one new, and demonstrates how interactive teaching/learning situations can be structured through their application to attain prespecified objectives which require communication, group decision making, planning, or simple interactive skills. Frame games, the older concept, are…

This chapter examines the need for and practice of instructional development within the liberal arts college. The context of the liberal arts college is described, the likely demand for liberal arts education by society is examined, and new evidence for the effect of a liberal arts education on the student is explored. The potential and actual…

This chapter addresses the relationship between three different approaches to educational improvement--instructional development (ID), organizational development (OD), and faculty development (FD). These three approaches are related to each other using the concept of readiness for innovation, and a spiral relationship is postulated: an individual,…