Major aspects of instructional design and development emphasizing learning outcomes, instructional objectives, and strategies in the context of theory and practice. Emphasis on knowledge and skills required to create instructional design rationale.
My first exposure to ADDIE was back in 2005, when as a new training consultant I was tasked with not only delivering instruction in proprietary tools, but also developing instructional deliverables in work settings. The company I worked for made extensive use of the ADDIE process on a high level when proposing training programs, usually in ERP subjects such as SAP and Oracle, to potential clients. The “A” was often done on a comprehensive top level by a senior consultant. That consultant also usually did the first “D”: designing the overall approach to not only end-user training, but organizational change management and hypercare (post-go-live support). Other senior consultants would then come in and do the design at the course level: decide, in collaboration with the client, what belongs in a training course and what does not. As a not-senior consultant, I began my career in this field by doing the second “D”: developing the deliverables, which almost always consisted of PowerPoints for instructor-led training, step-by-step work instructions, and hands-on exercise sheets with data that learners could use to practice in a realistic but non-live training environment.
As the years went on, I gained more experience in design of individual courses, and a small amount of experience in being the architect (analyst) of an overall training solution. But I still think of myself as a developer. This course gave me much more solid practice and theory behind the analysis and design essentials needed to present a well-conceived educational program to a potential client.
The image at the bottom of the page, Mr. Potato Head as an instructional designer, is a standard deliverable in this course: create a physical model representing what we think are the most important competencies of an excellent instructional designer. Those competencies, established by IBSTPI, are helpful to me as I round out my professional development. More about the competencies and my self-evaluation of them may be found on the Practical Application page.
Work Samples
The bulk of the grade in this course revolves around collaboration, which is reasonable, since in the field we don’t design and develop in a vacuum: even when I was a solo practitioner, I collaborated with client subject matter experts and with resource and tool experts to create the best possible deliverables.
In addition to the video presentation on the Selected Projects page, I’m delighted to present the final report Pooja Gupta, Marie Pennucci, and I collaborated on which revolves around a real-life problem Pooja is encountering in her work environment.
Final Grade: A
Beth's Journey Through the Instructional Design Universe 