Do you all have a life? Norway has great scenery and skiing. Japan is rich in history and culture. Even Australia has more to offer than cyberspace. However, we all know that the man from Georgia never signs off. Nevertheless, your thoughtful responses have been very interesting.
Steve Tripp [20 Feb 96], as supported by other web dwellers, is absolutely correct--instructional design is not the science, it is a technology. A more semantically correct statement would be, "There is a science of instruction and a technology of instructional design based on this science." Perhaps before the reclaim statement is chiseled in the base of the statue, Merrill and associates will correct this error. An analogy comes to mind:
Once upon a time a Sea Horse gathered up his seven pieces of eight and cantered out to find his fortune. Before he had traveled very far he met an Eel, who said, "Psst. Hey, bud. Where 'ya goin'?" "I'm going out to find my fortune," replied the Sea Horse, proudly. "You're in luck," said the Eel. "For four pieces of eight you can have this speedy flipper, and the you'll be able to get there a lot faster." "Gee, that's swell," said the Sea Horse, and paid the money and put on the flipper and slithered off at twice the speed. Soon he came upon a Sponge, who said, "Psst. Hey, bud. Where 'ya goin'?" "I'm going out to find my fortune," replied the Sea Horse. "You're in luck," said the Sponge. "For a small fee I will let you have this jet-propelled scooter so that you will be able to travel a lot faster." So the Sea Horse bought the scooter with his remaining money and went zooming through the sea five times as fast. Soon he came upon a Shark, who said, "Psst. Hey, bud. Where 'ya goin'?" "I'm going out to find my fortune," replied the Sea Horse. "You're in luck. If you'll take this short cut," said the Shark, pointing to his open mouth, "you'll save yourself a lot of time." "Gee, thanks," said the Sea Horse, and zoomed off into the interior of the Shark, there to be devoured.
The moral of this fable is that if you're not sure where you're going, you're liable to end up someplace else--and not even know it. (The above fable is from Robert F. Mager, 1962, Preparing Instructional Objectives.)
There seem to be a lot of people who don't seem to know where they are going. Neophytes who are pursing instructional technology need one or two firm sign posts, at least they need to know that there are persons who support both alternatives.
And since Mike [Spector, 20 Feb 96] put us in a literary mood, may I sight a passage or two from one of my favorite authors:
The cat grinned when it saw Alice. It looked good-natured, she thought: still it had very long claws and a great many teeth, so she felt that it ought to be treated with respect.
"Cheshire Puss," she began, rather timidly, as she did not at all know whether it would like the name: however, it only grinned a little wider. "Come, it's pleased so far," thought Alice, and she went on. "Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?"
"That depends a good deal on where you want to get to," said the Cat.
"I don't much care where..." said Alice.
"Then it doesn't matter which way you go," said the Cat.
"...so long as I get somewhere," Alice added as explanation.
"Oh, you're sure to do that," said the Cat, "if you only walk long enough."
Thank you Lewis Carroll
And finally
There was a book lying near Alice on the table, ... she turned over the leaves, to find some part that she could read, "...for it's all in some language I don't know," she said to her self.
It was like this.
Jabberwocky
"Twas brillig, and the slithy toves
Did gyre and gimble in the wabe:
All mimsy were the borogoves,
And the mome raths outgrabe."
And the rest is left as an exercise for the student.
Would Jabberism or Constrowacky be a better term?
Thanks to Tom for Philosophy 101 [Reeves, 21 Feb 96].
I don't know much about ontology, and if we wandered down this road it was not by intention, however, I do like Mike's summary of our work...
[quoting Spector, 23 Feb 96] Dave's ID2 seems to me to be founded on an ontology--there are in the world three basic kinds of things: entities, activities, and processes--that then determines what there is to learn about and how to design instruction to facilitate learning... This starting point has some very discernible advantages: it has concrete implications and these implications can be and are being tested. Those with a genuine interest in our discipline and an openness of mind are likely to find value in the development and testing of Dave's theory.
May I close by quoting myself from the preface to Instructional Design Theory? (Larry Lipsitz even suggested that the title might be an oxymoron)...
"What I've tried to do," continued Skinner, "is to make only a few assumptions and then see how much of human learning we can explain with only these assumptions." He went on to defend his theory and the point he made in his speech. I stopped listening before he ended his explanation.
"Good grief," I thought, "psychology is just an oar and a rubber boot as well [you might want to read the whole preface for the context of this comment]. Psychological systems are not reality either, but merely logical systems that try to explain what we observe in the real world. Behavior is merely one logical system that is tested against reality to see how good a match can be found Just like there can be many different number systems, there can be many different psychological systems. Each is tested against reality to see how close it fits, but none are reality, merely inventions...
"Later in my graduate career I had one additional insight. We were studying learning and some instructional theories. It was apparent that learning theories tended to explain how persons acquire and store knowledge, but they have very little to say about how an instructor should structure and sequence knowledge to promote efficient and effective learning. It occurred to me that one could build a logical system, a theory of instruction. So I said, "Let there be an instructional oar and a rubber boot [entities, activities, and processes]."
The rest is history. So we have drawn a line in "...the shifting sands of new paradigms and realities."
We claim no special TRUTH, merely a defense of what we believe is a sound approach to the comparison of our theoretical inventions to reality. Three hundred years from now, in the great beyond, we will all look back on our experiences in mortality and realize that we are all infants babbling our first words with little or no understanding of their meaning.
We hold no animosity for our friends who pursue other "ways of knowing." Some attempt to match these inventions with reality would be of interest, until then, Mike is right about our tone, we cannot take these positions seriously.
We don't want to cast anyone out of the discipline of instructional science or the technology of instructional design, however, those who decry scientific method? and who deride instructional strategies don't need to be cast off; they have exited the discipline on their own. They can hold to whatever view of reality, or no reality, that they wish. But when they claim, "Instructional Design is dead!," that "The influence of Robert Gagne is likely to vanish by the turn of the century," then it is important that there be a milepost to which our new young folks in instructional technology can look for guidance.
Remember the direction of the Cheshire Cat:
"In that direction," the Cat said, waving its right paw round, "lives a Hatter [instructivist]: and in that direction," waving the other paw, "lives a March Hare [constructivist]. Visit either you like: they're both mad."
"But I don't want to go among mad people," Alice remarked.
"Oh, you can't help that," said the Cat: "we're all mad here."