Old technology is still good technology for some.............?

Hmmmm........

Well before we kick start, sorry I delayed in getting back to the forum, How is everybody and the design course work? Men, it is in a class of its own. Wow, man is always working.

Well forget it, lets get back to the substantial issue,

Yes, the question was...... Old technology is still good technology for some.............?

It reminded me of my lecturer in heat and electricity as forms of energy. You won't believe it, but he insisted that, even though we had electronic calculators on us, all our computations be done manually. Well, that's by the way.

But what challenge does a case like this provides us. Is it possible to still make progress with technology, or simply to remain stack in the past with boses who still prefer the old 'techs'?. My asnswer to the later is a definite no, we will not remain in the past but make progress into the present and move into the future still 'current'.

What comes to mind is deligence in planning our instructions. Morrison et all; in their book Designing effective instruction noted that, to meet the needs of the client, one need to do serious leaner and context analysis. By doing this, the designer will know about the audience that might influence the design of material as well as the characteristic of the learners.

Regarding the learners, the designer must consider the general characteristics (gender, age, work, experience, education and ethnicity), specific charateristic (pre-requisite skills, attitudes, what they might want to gain from the course as in benefits) and learning styles of the learner(does he learn as an individual or in a group etc).

These if done correctly with a good survey of available material and equipment, planning, designing and delivery of instruction should definitely be tilted to a 90+ per cent success.

But what happen to my old director, we leave his tools intact for him and daily try to pursue him to use the new tecnologies as I currently do with him.

Well see you soon, I promise to be more regular this time. Cheeriooo.......

Is it worth spending Billions on instructional design

This was the obvious question I asked myself when I considered what comes to play in designing instructions. The very first instructional design was in the 1960s at an estimated cost of $350,000. This huge investment needed in any form and kind of good instructional designs has not changed even in our days. The cost of audio and video recorders, printers and other printing materials, the enormous energy and time that one needs to put into any form of design and many others are still high, and I shudder anytime I have to think about it.

The fact also remain that, the returns on the many huge investments made on instructional designs have come in multiples of the initial capital. The $350,000 investment made on the first ever documented instructional design resulted in a savings of $37 million over a five-year period between 1968 and 1973 (Morrison et al, 2007). The same authors observed that, we need to do instructional design because; it comes with a lot of financial benefits. Aside this, problems with skills and knowledge deficiency could be improved, leading to improved returns in any form of investment in training.

In Ghana, it is no secret that, problems with instruction are everywhere. Schools, hospitals, businesses, the government and even law enforcing agencies are daily battling with how to get people do the most desired things. The use of instructional design I believe can help us out of this challenges. Why this believe, even though the returns of instructional design are not so immediate, savings from them I have realized after reading the first few chapters in the book on “Designing Effective Instruction” by Morrison et al, is very high. I am more convinced that, it is high time investment into instructional design is made here in Ghana.

For a start, I will want to take advantage of the depth of information in this book to start designing instructions for some aspect of chemistry practical. As a science educationist and a onetime science student, I do know of the difficulties involved in practical work.

Do visit my site regularly for an update on my progress. Feel free to let me know of how you see my work.

Ref:
Morrison et al (2007), Designing Effective Instruction, John Wiley & Sons, Inc., USA

Project Intent Statement

Project: Preparing for Chemistry Practical Examination

Background
Who:
The project is intended for Senior High School teachers preparing students to take Volumetric and Quanlitative tests in Chemistry at the end of their study at that level.

What:
Selected Senior high Schools in Ghana offer elective chemistry for students pursuing science. These are examined at the end of their studies at that level by the West African Examinations Council (WAEC), in Volumetric and Qualitative Analysis, and their performance determines which programme they are offered at the tertiary institutions they and in extension the professions they can later choose in life.

Why:
The performance of students over the years in their final examination has been appalling. According to the Chief Examiners reports of WAEC (1997,1998,2000, 2001 – 2006), even though student showed very good understanding of question on volumetric and qualitative analysis and usually presented their results in the required formats, they still have numerous problems with their practical work. These reports observed that, students over the years in answering questions on volumetric analysis, they usually:
· Wrote wrong units for their titre values. Such wrong units included units in cm-3 and grams.
· Some altered their titre values several times showing lack of confidence in themselves or even making examiners suspect that they received help.
· Other candidates did not know what consistent titres are and hence averaged all three or four titres.
Then for qualitative analysis, candidates
· Have difficulty to distinguish between chalky and gelatinous precipitates
· They have problems describing the activities tested which showed that they were not exposed to those activities in the classroom.
On the hind side, students daily complain about the lack of practical activities in their schools, whiles teachers complain of loaded school syllabus, lack of relevant teaching and learning materials, and in a few cases lack of relevant knowledge in some of the practical related skills they are expected to assist students to acquire.
Most worrying however is that, beyond the poor student’s performance in the WAEC Examinations, employers of science products from the Senior High Schools now have a lot of reservations about student’s practical abilities. This instruction is therefore designed to help teachers at the Senior High School level access easy and straight to the point instructions that can be used to help their student’s master practical skills in chemistry.

Project statement:
Use a combination of media (Video, audio, posters etc), computers and the internet to train and help students acquire relevant skills in volumetric and qualitative analysis in chemistry.

Problem Identification
Science, and Chemistry major student for that matter, at the Senior High School level in Ghana performs quite poorly in their WAEC exams. The few who are able to do well are not able to apply the knowledge acquired after school for lack of understanding and the relevant skills that should go with the concepts learnt.
A critical look at the problem reveals that, a few teachers who train these students in chemistry in some cases are themselves ‘deficient’ in the subject area. The many others who may be ok with the subject knowledge content do not in most cases have the laboratory and or materials to teach with. This situation has and is creating a generation of ‘illiterate chemistry graduates’ for Ghana – a situation that need to be tackle now.

Target Audience
Teachers of Chemistry at the Senior High School level in Ghana. These form an important bridge; that links the upcoming chemists to industry in this country.

Identified Need/ Benefit
Students at the Senior High School level need appropriate practical skills to enable them pass their examinations on volumetric and qualitative analysis in chemistry. The lack of equipped laboratories, adequate and well trained teachers of chemistry, and the overloaded school syllabi and calendar means, many students will come out of school inadequately prepared with these skills. By using different media, computers and the Internet in instruction, teachers should be better equipped to train their students faster, easier, and with the right kind of skills, knowledge and concepts.
With the introduction of the new educational reforms, computers are to play a central role in instruction. This design hopefully will come up with a chemistry software, the very first in the Ghanaian context, for chemistry teachers to use in their lessons

Bye-InThis instruction could be used beyond the intended purpose by teachers and other educationists for in-service training. Students could also be able to use this instruction on their own for the purposes of revision. Then schools that lack qualified chemistry teachers can use the video, posters, audio recordings and sometimes Webqu