In this article, the authors present the findings of an intensive training series designed to train school-site teams in functional assessment procedures. They examined the extent to which participation in an intensive training series that included on-site follow-up was sufficient to provide participants with the knowledge and skills necessary to…

Web-based education and training provides a new paradigm for imparting knowledge; students can access the learning material anytime by operating remotely from any location. Web3D open standards, such as X3D and VRML, support Web-based delivery of Educational Virtual Environments (EVEs). EVEs have a great potential for learning and training…

Academic outcomes for students with emotional and behavioral disorders (EBD) are poor. Unfortunately, insufficient attention is paid in research and textbooks to academic difficulties and students with EBD. The purpose of this special issue is to review research-based strategies and interventions for teaching children and youth with EBD. In the…

For the second language student, proficiency is a measure of what tasks can be accomplished with acquired language and how well they can be accomplished. The necessity for specification of functional proficiency arose, and resulted in the publication of guidelines by the American Council on the Teaching of Foreign Languages (ACTFL)'s guidelines…

This paper discusses the importance of considering the social context in which an instructional product will be used during the development process. It is contended that traditional instructional product development models are inadequate because they ignore social context. The use of inadequate traditional design models results in the development…

Curriculum developers must work hard to avoid the "what errors" of curriculum development. They must avoid failing to teach what should be taught and teaching what is no longer relevant and needed. Curriculum "what errors" are likely to occur when teachers design courses so as to teach what they know best, what they were…

This report considers a range of issues involved in doing case-study research with emphasis on the potential for and the problems associated with this approach in distance education. The report begins with an introduction to the case-study research methodology, noting that it is not widely recognized as an approach in distance education.…

Instructional Design Expert (ID Expert) is a prototype instructional design expert system which supports the instructional design phase of instructional system development. It differs from other instructional design toolkits in that it is built using a knowledge engineering approach, and has been implemented as an expert system. The system…

This paper explores the course-planning activities of faculty teaching introductory undergraduate courses, in order to assess influences on the process of curriculum revision. The findings of a survey of 2,311 faculty members in 97 institutions of higher education are previewed here, prior to publication. The study found that faculty from…

This paper, which updates and expands on the first edition (1981), begins by presenting a definition of instructional development (ID) and a discussion of its origins. A taxonomy for classifying ID models is then suggested, and it is noted that most ID models have been subjected to only a limited degree of testing. The 12 ID models that are…

Assistance for school districts, accreditation teams, and education service centers in the development and use of local curriculum documents is provided in this publication. District responsibility to develop local curriculum guides has led to a lack of standardization, which in turn has complicated assessment. State requirements and standards for…

Discipline-based art education (DBAE) can best be understood as a curriculum construct if it is seen in the context of traditional, major curriculum orientations. The three major curriculum orientations are child-centered orientation, society-centered orientation, and subject-centered orientation. DBAE is a contemporary construct of the…

This handbook is designed for use in conjunction with staff training seminars designed to provide teachers and administrators with a framework and procedures for designing and implementing effective applications of technologies in the curriculum. The intended outcome of the seminars is the development of comprehensive programs including the…

To explore the principal's role as instructional leader in school improvement strategies, this research brief focuses on characteristics of effective schools, a profile of effective principals, and a discussion with Dr. Steven Bossert, Associate Laboratory Director for Research and Development at Far West Laboratory in San Francisco, California,…

Instructional development, a systematic way of applying standards of critical thought to the design of instructional materials and programs, is advocated for its potential contribution to consistency of instructional purposes and actions, adaptability, and internal accountability. Steps in the systematic method, the evaluation problem, and choice…