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Minimalist Educational Materials for Distance Delivery. Ken McKee - BEd, BSc, PTC Northern Alberta Institute of Technology www.GetToThePoint.ca. Minimalism / Education. I hear, I forget I see, I remember I do, I understand ~Confuscious Education should be useful.
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Minimalist Educational Materials for Distance Delivery Ken McKee - BEd, BSc, PTC Northern Alberta Institute of Technology www.GetToThePoint.ca www.GetToThePoint.ca
Minimalism / Education • I hear, I forget • I see, I remember • I do, I understand ~Confuscious Education should be useful. If it is not, what is it? ~Whitehead www.GetToThePoint.ca
Overview • Traditional delivery problems • Distance delivery problems • How does Learning occur? • What is Education? • What is Minimalism? • Minimalist Solutions www.GetToThePoint.ca
Traditional Delivery Problems • Books • Too thick • Not directly applicable • Students • Very busy with time restraints • Don’t, won’t, can’t read • Technology • More time requirements • Different platforms www.GetToThePoint.ca
Problems with Traditional Delivery • Teachers • Lecture • Control concerns • Class size, ability levels, interest • Content applicability www.GetToThePoint.ca
Distant Delivery Problems • Materials make or break technology solutions • No teacher in sight • Technology to overcome • Texts too thick, where do I look? • Questions via email can be numerous www.GetToThePoint.ca
What is Education? • “Education is the acquisition of the art of the utilization of knowledge” ~Whitehead • "Develop the best pedagogy you can. See how well you can do. Then analyze the nature of what you did that worked." ~ Jerome Bruner www.GetToThePoint.ca
Who decides what is usable? • Students should experience the joy of discovery and understand the application here and now in the circumstances of his/her life. ~Whitehead • Appreciation by use • The external connections of the subject drag thought outwards www.GetToThePoint.ca
Ideas, which are not utilized, are positively harmful (inert) ~Whitehead www.GetToThePoint.ca
The problem of keeping knowledge alive, of preventing it from becoming inert, is the central problem of all education. ~Whitehead www.GetToThePoint.ca
Education is the evocation of curiosity, of judgment, of the power of mastering a complicated tangle of circumstances, the use of theory in giving foresight in special cases www.GetToThePoint.ca
Romance Stage of Education • First stage of apprehension • Appreciation of connections • Education must essentially be a setting in order of a ferment already stirring in the mind www.GetToThePoint.ca
Precision Stage of Education • Represents an addition to knowledge • Analyzing the facts, bit by bit www.GetToThePoint.ca
Generalization Stage of Education • Return to romanticism with the added advantage of classified ideas and relevant technique www.GetToThePoint.ca
What is Minimalism? • Brevity of materials • www.GetToThePoint.ca • Materials that work and work well • Self paced • Applicable www.GetToThePoint.ca
Minimalist Solutions • Create the best applied materials you can • Work as if you were a student • Test the materials with students • Questions indicate areas to adjust • Rework, test materials again • Could students write an introduction at end of chapter? • Rework, test, rework, test www.GetToThePoint.ca
Minimalist Strategies • All learning tasks should be meaningful and self contained • Learners should be given realistic projects ASAP • Instructions permit self-directed reasoning and improvising • Increase the number of active learning activities www.GetToThePoint.ca
Minimalist Strategies • Training materials and activities should provide for error recognition and recovery • Close linkage between the training and the actual system (job) • Minimize instructional materials which obstruct learning www.GetToThePoint.ca
Applying Minimalist Principals • Action centered tasks • Focus on what user needs • Omit long introductions • Omit repetition and verbiage • Exploit what user already knows • Rely on users to think and improvise www.GetToThePoint.ca
References • Carroll, J.M. 1990. The Nurnberg Funnel • Carroll, J.M. 1998. Minimalism Beyond the Nurnberg Funnel • Eiler, M.A. 1997. Minimalism and Documentation Downsizing • Reddish, J. 1999. A Practical Guide to Useability Testing • Reddish, J. 1999. Building usability into your documentation, Interfaces and websites • Whitehead, A.N. 1929. The Aims of Education
Minimalist Websites and Links • Minimalism (J. Carroll):http://tip.psychology.org/carroll.htmlhttp://dabcc-www.nmsu.edu/bis/comtec/RC/carroll/ • Minimalism and Documentation:http://english.ttu.edu/kairos/3.1/reviews/eiler/minimal.html • Cognitive Approaches to Instructional Design:http://carbon.cudenver.edu/~bwilson/training.html • Achieving Minimalism Through Interactive Multimedia:http://www.stc.org/51stConf/sessionMaterial/dataShow.asp?ID=137 • Technical Writers of India (TWIN):http://www.twin-india.org/Minimalism.html • Usability Testing: http://www.usability.govhttp://stcsig.org/usability www.GetToThePoint.ca