Tell, Show, Do, Apply: The Anatomy of Good Instruction

This article was originally posted at elearningindustry.com. 

There are a lot of opinions about how to design quality instruction. New technologies, theories, and processes are continually created and touted as the next greatest thing for instructional designers. And while these new technologies can be powerful, there are a few key instructional strategies that must be implemented to maximize learning effectiveness. 

 These principles have consistently been shown to increase learning and engagement, but often instructional designers become enamored by the new technologies and fail to implement these strategies effectively. In this post, we will describe these strategies and show how you can use them effectively in your design.

 We can categorize all instructional activities into two basic categories:

1. Stuff that the Instruction or Instructor does, and
2. Stuff that the Learner does. Within these categories there are four basic strategies for creating excellent instruction: tell, show, do, and apply.

The Four Basic Strategies for Creating Excellent Instruction

1. Tell
   The first component of good instruction is the Tell strategy. This is the strategy used to provide the learner with key information related to their learning. Facts, concepts, rules, and procedures can all be conveyed using the Tell strategy. For example, if you were designing instruction to teach customer service representatives how to offer a new product to their existing customers, you would tell them the specific steps they would go through to offer the product and even show a visual outline of the steps.
2. Show
   The second component of good instruction is the Show strategy. This is the strategy used to demonstrate examples of what you want to teach. In the customer service example, you would show a variety of real examples of an agent offering the product to the learner. You would probably show "non-examples" as well- examples of what not to do when offering the products. These examples will help the learner see how the information you told them is applied.
3. Do
   After providing a variety of examples, you should provide your learners with the opportunity to Do what you have taught them. In the customer service example, the learners take several calls with actual customers and offer them the product. Trainers and managers listen in on these calls and provide the learners with feedback and guidance. It is important that learners be given plenty of feedback as they apply what they have learned so that they can improve their skills and abilities. As in this example, the is application of the new knowledge should replicate the real-world environment as much as possible to make the learning experience authentic and engaging.
4. Apply
   The final component is Apply. In this step, learners plan out how they will apply their knowledge in their own environments. In the customer service example, the learners plan out their own personalized scripts for specific situations and set goals for offering and selling products to their clients.

These basic strategies align with several known theories of instruction. For example, they support Merrill's First Principles of Instruction, a well-known theory of instruction that is based on extensive research. Gagne's 9 Events of Instruction also align well with these strategies.

The next time you design a piece of instruction, ask yourself how well you are using these strategies. If you will conscientiously apply them, you will find increased student learning and instructional design effectiveness.

ADDIE Process - the Design Phase

This post is part 2 in a series on the ADDIE Process of Instructional Design.

Design 

After performing an effective analysis, it is important to design your unit of instruction. This means planning out how you will help your students (1) acquire the knowledge and skills you have identified in your analysis, (2) apply that knowledge in meaningful ways, and (3) receive feedback and guidance on their learning. In the design phase, you build on the analysis you have performed. It will guide your thinking and planning.

 There are several steps that can be followed in the design phase. These include:

1. Analyze the subject matter -You need to have a thorough grasp of the content that the student will be required to understand and use. This analysis usually means breaking the content down into appropriate chunks of information, identifying how these chunks should be taught based on what kind of content they are- knowledge, skills, attitude, real-world task, etc.
2. Plan out instructional activities -Based on your analysis, you will need to plan out specifically how you will help your students to reach the goals and objectives you devised in your analysis. This includes creating all activities that will help your students acquire the knowledge they need, and practice applying it in meaningful ways. For help on this, see the section Evidence-based practice below.
3. Storyboard instructional activities -An important step in designing your instruction is storyboarding. This means laying out the sequence of the instructional activities. This can be done in a Word document, in a powerpoint document, on a whiteboard, or on a wall. Some people storyboard in the actual medium they will be developing in, like a Learning Management System. Whatever you do, the point is to plan out a logical sequence of learning activities for the learner.

Evidence-based Practice

As you design your instruction, be sure to use evidence-based practice- in other words, use what works. But what works? What guidance does research and experience give? There are a few fundamental principles of instruction that should be used when teaching knowledge and skills. I have discussed these generally in a previous post on Merrill's First Principles of Instruction. In addition, Gagne's 9 Events of Instruction have empirical evidence supporting their use and are easily implemented.

It is easy to get caught up in a fad or do what seems creative of flashy. But these things can be distracting to students and can actually detract from the effective design of instruction. An example of a distracting but common theory of how people learn is Learning Styles, which I write about here. Learning styles sound credible, but there is actually little or no evidence that adapting instruction to learning styles is actually effective.

I recommend watching this video, which gives a nice overview of the design phase:

Click here for next phase: Development

The "Learning Styles" Fallacy

As I have taught my graduate students over the past few semesters, it is surprising how many bring up learning styles as a valid frame of reference for a trainer or an instructional designer. A learning styles approach assumes that different people learn more effectively in different ways; for example, people view themselves as "visual learners" or as "kinesthetic learners."

The Fallacy
While this theory seems to make some sense, there is actually little or no empirical evidence that learning styles are a legitimate way to view learners when designing instruction. This has been reported on in some news sources, (for example here or here), which are based on this research study. The researchers in this study conclude that there is currently no evidence supporting the use of learning styles when creating training and designing instruction.

What to do?
So, if learning styles don't give a good foundation for creating instruction or training, what should we consider? This is an important question and there is an answer: To have the greatest chance of designing and delivering effective instruction, trainers and instructional designers need to base their instruction on research-based principles and instructional theories. (I've described how good instructional designers use these and other "tools" in a previous post entitled What is Instructional Design? part 2).

Here is a very short list of instructional theories and principles that a trainer or instructional designer can refer to when considering how to design and develop high quality training and instruction:

1. Gagne's 9 Events of Instruction. These best practices are based on decades of research. They provide specific steps to take when delivering instruction to a learner.
2. Merrill's First Principles of Instruction. A more current theory of instruction, these principles prescribe effective, research-based methods for teaching complex skills and knowledge. I describe these principles in more detail in a previous post entitled Merrill's First Principles of Instruction.
3. Principles of e-learning.  Clark and Mayer (2011) summarize these principles extremely well. The share how to create online training and instruction that adheres to best practices based on the evidence.

There are many, many more resources out there, but these provide a basic foundation for implementing instruction that is based on evidence instead of on unfounded ideas.

What Would You Add?
What else would you add to this list? What other research-based practices are available to help budding trainers and instructional designers create effective learning experiences for their learners? Do you agree that learning styles should be eliminated from our vocabulary as professionals and scholars?