Model-centered learning and instructional design

Abstract

This chapter discusses how the approach of mental models can be ap- plied to Instructional Design (ID) and eventually leads to a theoretical concept of model-centered Instructional Design. The various critiques of Instructional Design which describe ID as too fixed, slow and which doubt that there is room for ID in the Information Society, will serve as the starting point for the discussion. This contribution takes up these critical views and opens up a look at ID from a modelcentered perspective. The argumentation starts out with a reference to the underlying epistemological foundations and is based on the fundamental understanding of human cognition as the construction of mental models when confronted with more or less complex challenges. Further-on the application of the concept of mental models to learning and Instruction is the building block to ID. Thus ID is understood as a higher-order process of model construction. Thereby the approach of mental models can lead to a new perspective on Instructional Design, which can successfully defend against the critiques of Information Technologists. However, Model-Centered Instructional Design may help to see existing excellent layouts of ISD products from another perspective, which helps to understand the mystery of the human learning processes more precisely than other can do. The question if this leads to a paradigm shift in Educational Science hasn't been answered yet. © 2008 Springer-Verlag US.