Directive

Directive Learning Experiences are most often structured lessons with rubrics and assessments to promote a common outcome delivered by a teacher and/or computer managed instruction. However, they also range from helpful tutorials on YouTube to full learning courses where everything you need is contained in the program. An online instructor may have created a set of assignments where the learner listens to a recorded lecture, reads a textbook chapter, does some kind of problem, responds weekly to a discussion forum and takes a test.

Horror Alley:

  • Have you scraped through college chemistry where the expectations are so high that the professor brags about the number of failures because the department wants only the "cream of the crop" to succeed?

  • When the university in a large state required sexual harassment training, you quickly discovered that the program had multiple choice questions that would tell you "no" until you clicked the right answer? Just cheat your way through to get it over with.

  • In a fair sized city, all landlords must take an online course on how to be good to your tenants and follow the law. If you spend hours reading all the material on line and then go into the city office to take the test, you can ask the clerk if you passed. She says, "oh, everyone passes. That will be $80 for your certificate!"

  • Have you had a problem with a computer program and looked up the tutorial, only to discover that the help is for a previous version?

Thank You Street!

  • Have you looked up a fix your toilet video on YouTube and saved a $200 plumber bill?

  • Have you used DuoLingo to study just enough French to get around on your trip to Paris?

  • Do you know a teen who was very ill but was able to take a couple of online courses and graduated with the class?

The more prescriptive online experiences are, the more difficult it is for a digial learning leader to make any contribution to the teaching and learning going on. It is only when the instructor is flexible or when the computer program allows for choices that our leader can have an effect.

Here are a few suggestions when you, as the digital learning leader, discover a problem. You will be able to document other ideas you have tried successfully for your portfolio:

  • When an instructor discovered that every English language learner in the class was failing, you worked alongside that instructor to solve the problem.

  • When you discovered an online program like our Horror Alley examples, you got a seat at the decision making table to get rid of, redesign, fix, and create something that not only produced better results, but got rave reviews from learners.

  • When data analysis shows that most learners are procrastinating until the bitter end to do the work, you do focus groups to find out why and then do something about it.

  • When you discover that information rescuers assigned to the learner are culturally insensitive, too difficult, stereotypical, outdated or have other inaccuracies or bias, you work with the instructor to make the needed changes.

  • When you discover that some learners don't have access to devices and Internet connection, you work to resolve this major problem.

There is a major idea that computers can be used to control content and learning. This concept is used to eliminate the variability in human teachers. The idea is to bring every learner up to a certain degree of mastery of either content or skill. In this case, the human teacher, if there is one, has no control over the content and can only mentor the learner if there is time to complete the various tasks. In such cases, learners have almost no say in what is to be learned and how it is to be learned. In an attempt to raise assessment scores across the nation, major U.S. government grants have been given to universities to design experiences where the computer tracks every key stroke, time, error rate and anything else they can about the learner. It becomes the robot teacher trying to turn the learner into a robot.

Digital learning leaders are wise to conduct focus groups of students in directive experiences. Some students might prefer the prescriptive computer program. Check out the gifted students; the struggling learners, and those in the middle. Who thrives? Who is bored? Who just give up? Do an analysis for decision makers. A one size fits all solution is probably never going to be the silver bullet. Let you voice and the voice of learners get heard.