Merrill's 5 Star Instructional Design Rating

Summary:

Merrill’s 5 Star Instructional Design Rating presents a simple method for evaluating instructional products based on five questions:

1. Is the courseware presented in the context of read world problems?
2. Does the courseware attempt to activate relevant prior knowledge or experience?
3. Does the courseware demonstrate (show examples) of what is to be learned rather than merely tell information about what is to be learned?
4. Do learners have an opportunity to practice and apply their newly acquired knowledge or skill?
5. Does the courseware provide techniques that encourage learners to integrate (transfer) the new knowledge or skill into their everyday life? (Merrill, 2007)

Each of these questions includes sub-questions that can be asked in order to make the correct assessment. 

Critique:

I like the simplicity of Merrill’s 5 Star Instructional Design Rating and that it’s presented in a manner that should be easy to use when I evaluate the two e-learning courses. Merrill could have created this rating system using a series of checklists with statements such as “All demonstrations (examples) are consistent with the content being taught.” Instead, he poses questions, which caused me to pause and reflect for a moment. I think I would have been more likely to skim over statements.

My main critique with this reading is that Merrill uses unfamiliar terms in the beginning that are also vague at times. For example, he doesn’t explain what he means by “kinds-of,” “how-to,” and “what-happens.” It’s assumed that the reader knows what he means, but this wasn’t the case for me. In addition, he recommends using his rating system for tutorial or experiential courseware but never explains how he would define these types of courseware; he only explains what they aren’t: receptive or exploratory courseware.

Ratings for Instructional Products:

1.       E-learning course on how to give core messages

http://elearning-examples.s3.amazonaws.com/Core-Messages/index.html

•  I gave this course a silver star for presenting content in the context of real world problems. It addresses the first two sub-points but involves a single problem, not a progression of problems.
• I gave this course no stars for activation of prior knowledge. There is no pre-test and the learner is never asked to recall prior knowledge.
• I gave the course a gold star for demonstration of concepts to be learned. It does this very well and provides multiple examples and non-examples. It uses short videos for these examples, which is the right choice of media for this content.
•  I gave the course a silver star for application because the practice activity is realistic, effective, and provides helpful feedback; however, the learner cannot access help if necessary.
• I gave the course a silver star for integration. The main objective is to deliver core messages related to abstinence and safe sex in a clear and unbiased manner. There is a question and answer section that provides integration guidance; however, since this is an e-learning course, there is no realistic way for the student to demonstrate the new skill because that would require public speaking.

Final score = three silver stars and one gold star. If you have time, I definitely recommend checking out the course. It’s a good example of e-learning and it takes less than 10 minutes to complete. I would love to hear if you agree with my rating.

2.       E-learning course on how to give core messages

http://payson.tulane.edu/courses/ltl/projects/entrepreneur/main.swf

• I gave this course a gold star for presenting content in the context of real world problems. It addresses all three sub-points and is especially effective at presenting the problem in a series of steps.
• As with the first course I reviewed, I gave this course no stars for activation of prior knowledge. There is no pre-test and the learner is never asked to recall prior knowledge.
• I gave the course a silver star for demonstration of concepts to be learned. I didn’t think the media used was always relevant to the content and it didn’t always enhance the training.
• I gave the course a gold star for application because there are many practice activities in the course that allow learners to reflect on and apply what they’ve learned. Good feedback is always provided.
• I gave the course a gold star for integration. The final assignment is a clever way to get the learner to reflect on what they’ve learned and take the first step of transferring their new knowledge to the real world in a realistic situation.

Final score = three gold stars and one silver star. I’m curious to see what ratings others assigned for this course.  

Merrill, M. D. (2007). 5 Star Instructional Design Rating. © M. David Merrill Retrieved 13 May 2011: http://id2.usu.edu/5Star/FiveStarRating.PDF

First Principles of Instruction

In “Prescriptive Principles for Instructional Design,” Merrill reviews instructional design models and theories by experts in the field and identifies five principles that many of the models/theories share in common. Merrill’s (2008) five principles for promoting learning, or what he calls the “first principles of instruction,” are:

·         Task-centered approach – Instruction should be sequenced in small tasks.

·         Activation principle – Instruction should activate the learner’s previous knowledge.

·         Demonstration principle – Instruction should include relevant demonstrations of new skills.

·         Application principle – Instruction should allow the learner to apply what they have learned and provide feedback.

·         Integration principle – Instruction should be relevant to real life and learners should have an opportunity to practice what they have learned in the real world (p.174). 

According to Merrill (2008), “these design principles apply regardless of the instructional program or practices prescribed by a given theory or model. If this premise is true, research will demonstrate that when a given instructional program or practice violates or fails to implement one or more of these underlying principles, there will be a decrement in learning and performance” (p.175). Merrill (2008) cites an example from Shell EP where over 65 courses were redesigned based on the first principles of instruction and this led to deeper learning, greater business relevance of the subject matter, and an increase in job performance (p.177).

I enjoyed Merrill’s analysis of other instructional design principles and how they overlap with the first principles of instruction. I don’t quite understand why Merrill included the section on Designing Task-Centered Instruction in this chapter. I felt it was out of place and incomplete. I thought Merrill would explain each principle in more detail, but he stopped after Task-Centered Instruction. In addition, I found the writing in this section confusing and Figures 14.3 and 14.4 did not clarify the concepts for me although I am a visual learner.

Merrill, M.D., Barclay, M. & A. van Schaak. (2008). Prescriptive Principles for Instructional Design. In M. J. Spector, et al., Handbook of Research on Educational Communications and Technology, 3^rd Edition (pp. 173-184). New York: Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group.