Designing Technology for Learning

Designing technologies that facilitate learning. Beyond usability, technology for learning has to engage, trigger prior knowledge, prompt for reflection, maintain a balance between too much cognitive load and too little challenge, and scaffold the development of skills.

• Week 1: How People Learn

• How memory works and how learning works
• Differences between experts and novices.
• Scaffolding learning.

• Week 2: Designing for Learning

• Know thy students
• Identifying learning objectives
• Creating learning activities

• Week 3: Examples

• Science education
• Computer science education
• Mathematics education

• Week 4: Evaluation

• How do you know if you got there? Testing your design decisions.
• Factors to measure: retention, completion, learning, attitudes.
• What makes a good evaluation? Validation and reliability