Needs
Assessment Assignment
The first step in instructional
design is to establish that there is a real need for
your project. In Instructional Technology a
"need" is defined as a gap between the
desired situation and the actual situation. This gap
should be expressed in terms of the results
you expect or the knowledge and skills that the
prospective students should have. It should not
be expressed in terms of the inputs or processes.
Some examples: productivity measurements in a factory
are results; being able to drive an
automobile safely is a set of skills;
having a course available for the patrons of a
library is an input.
Your needs assessment for this course will be
short and to the point. It will probably not be more
than one page long and will contain four major
elements:
- A
description/discussion of the desired
situation (the optimals). That is, if this
project goes well, what will be the result?
What will be people be doing differently from
what they are doing now? Why should they be
doing these things? Why is it important to
you, them, or others? What results are you
aiming for?
- A
description/discussion of the current
situation. What is happening now? What are
people doing now? Why does it need to change?
How do you know this?
- A
description/discussion of the gap or
difference between these two situations.
Also, why do you think that an instructional
unit is going to be the solution? Sometimes
problems like this can be solved in other
ways; sometimes they cannot be solved with
instruction at all.
- A clear concise statement of the
goal of the instruction, based on the above
analysis.