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Asia-Pacific Forum
on Science Learning and Teaching, Volume 10, Issue 2, Article12 (Dec., 2009) |
The experts suggested that the model demands some attention in regards to the requirement of time and effort consumption on the components and differences between novices and experts using the model. This might be the reason for ineffectiveness of the model in terms of utility, adaptability and feasibility. This point needs attention during impolementation phase. In fact, time and effort factors should be analyzed in detail after the implementation of the design model in biology courses; but novice and expert differences might not be so effective, since the model was proposed for education faculties in which members are familiar with the instructional design terms and approaches. As a support, the experts have also stated the appropriateness of the model at the university level. For the understandability aspect, the negative opinions focused on the lack of examples and explanations. As a solution to this problem, the requirements of each step have been explained in this paper under the section of Proposed Instructional Design Model for Teaching NOS. Despite all of these criticisms, as stated by E2, the model has provided an important framework for reaching goals related to scientific literacy in the context of biology courses. After all of the revisions from the critics, the final model was constructed (see Figure 3).
Figure 3. The revised final instructional design model for the nature of science teaching (NOS instructional design model)
Researchers writing about benefits of instructional design have been suggesting that the instructional design process increases the probability of goal attainment and fosters positive attitude and motivation, although there is no best way to design an instructional material (Morrison, Ross and Kemp, 2001). Dick, Carey and Carey (2005) have extended the benefits of the instructional design process by stating that systematic approach to instruction design provides an empirical and replicable process. As an empirical evidence, a study using the Dick and Carey Model has shown effectiveness of the model in biology learning contexts including environmental issues learning tasks (Bozdin &Park, 1999). The more comprehensive list of benefits of instructional design have been provided by Smith and Ragan (2005). The authors have written that a systematic instructional design encourages advocacy of learner, supports efficient, effective and appealing instruction, facilitates congruence among objectives, activities and assessment and provides intentional, systematic and certain framework for dealing with learning problems (Smith & Ragan, 2005). In addition to these general benefits of the instructional design process, it provides the contribution to see the separate components of instructional design models for NOS teaching in the same system. The literature of NOS teaching has shown a need for an explicit, intentional and systematic attention to teach NOS. The “explicit-embedded-reflective” approach has been shown to be an effective way for overcoming problems regarding misunderstandings of NOS (Khishfe & Lederman, 2007; Khishfe & Lederman, 2006). The systematic instructional model provides explicit and intentional attention which is requirement of the explicit-embedded-reflective approach. At the same time, the model has given a systematic framework for constructing a link between the components of the explicit-embedded-reflective approach beginning from planning, selection of activities and embedding strategy, conducting assessment and reflecting on the previous ideas and process to revising the approach.
In the literature, there is another example of developing and validating an instructional design approach by using a similar approach to the one used in this study. Tracey and Richey (2007) have incorporated the multiple intelligences approach into the Dick and Carey Model for instructional design. The authors have studied with four experts by using Delphi Study approach in three-round period. They have provided a validated and refined model by using two different theoretical lines as learning and instructional design.
In conclusion, the model might be an alternative for development of NOS teaching in university biology courses in the faculties of education. The proposed model in this study is a starting point to discuss the effectiveness of the model, so there is a need to implement the model in the real context. At the same time, there is a need to address critics in terms of theoretical appropriateness of the model for teaching NOS. In these courses, the existence of two sides of instruction as content and NOS knowledge needs further elaboration for balance and embedded strategies.
