4. Direct Instruction

Direct instruction recognizes the continuous need for the expertise of an experienced and responsible teacher who can identify the ideas and concepts worthy of study, provide the conceptual order, organize learning activities, guide the discourse, offer additional sources of information, diagnose misconceptions, and interject when required. (Garrison, 2011, p. 60)

INTRODUCTION

At the outset, let’s be clear about what direct instruction is not. Direct instruction is not lecturing. While it may provide information, suggestions, and direction, it is not antithetical to collaborative constructive (i.e., engaged) approaches to learning. Direct instruction is about ensuring that students achieve intended learning outcomes in a timely fashion without unnecessary frustration. It is an essential ingredient in any formal educational experience if we are to have assurance that worthwhile learning outcomes are realized.

Direct instruction is a crucial and developmental component of teaching presence in a community of inquiry. It has been shown that students expect structure and leadership (Garrison & Cleveland-Innes, 2005). Moreover, the complexity of blended learning design possibilities necessitates the need for structure and scholarly leadership. Given organizational structure (i.e., instructional design), direct instruction provides the leadership that will focus discourse and resolve issues in ways that facilitation alone is not intended to do. In formal educational learning environments, it is expected that discourse be purposeful, rigorous, and productive. This is the function of direct instruction. Evidence strongly suggests that perceived learning and satisfaction are associated with strong leadership (Akyol & Garrison, 2011b; Garrison, 2011).

Teaching presence has a natural developmental process. As we have explored in previous chapters, design and facilitation responsibilities most often demand the greatest attention as we create communities of inquiry. However, direct instruction issues will inevitably arise in our attempt to sustain open communication, group cohesion, and focused inquiry. These tasks go directly to sustaining a constructive social presence that is the foundation of a community of inquiry. From a social presence perspective, direct instruction is intended to maintain the educational and academic climate and direction.

Direct instruction, however, is also about focusing and resolving cognitive presence issues. Direct instruction recognizes the continuous need for “the expertise of an experienced and responsible teacher who can identify the ideas and concepts worthy of study, provide the conceptual order, organize learning activities, guide the discourse, offer additional sources of information, diagnose misconceptions, and interject when required” (Garrison, 2011, p. 60). Through these direct interventions we can be assured of an effective and efficient educational experience. That said, it is not inevitable that the instructor of record provide these services.

Notwithstanding the essential role of an experienced instructor, participants in a community of inquiry must be encouraged and afforded the opportunity to provide direction when necessary. The instructor should intervene only when significant issues arise that arrest the progress of timely development. These interventions must be limited if participants are to gain metacognitive awareness, responsibility, and control (monitoring and management) of their learning. Nothing will shut down discourse and undermine group cohesion faster than excessive direct intervention by the instructor. This goes to the core of understanding that teaching presence is a distributed responsibility and realizing that the ultimate goal of learning is to think and learn.

In previous chapters, we have explored the practical implications of the teaching presence principles for the design and facilitation of a blended community of inquiry. We now focus our attention on the direct instruction principles for creating and sustaining a blended community of inquiry. A successful blended community of inquiry and learning experience will be shaped by more than passive guidance. It will require content and pedagogical expertise to anticipate and proactively shape the environment and direction of the educational process in real time.

SOCIAL PRESENCE

The first principle for direct instruction is associated with sustaining a supportive environment and addressing issues that may undermine the trust and sense of belonging within the group.

PRINCIPLE: Sustain respect and responsibility.

This principle is associated with social presence responsibilities. We need to remind ourselves that social presence is concerned with open communication, group cohesion, and interpersonal relationships. Maintaining an open and cohesive community of inquiry requires a sensitive and sustained focus. Sustaining the climate, committing to the collaborative process, and developing interpersonal relationships is the essence of this principle. During the facilitation process, the challenge was to establish these properties of a community of inquiry. Once established, the challenge is to ensure that they grow and to address issues that may undermine the climate that mediates academic discourse.

From a social presence perspective, one of the important responsibilities of direct instruction is to be active in ensuring that open communication is not undermined by insensitive personal comments or overly critical, unproductive postings. Participants must be encouraged to question the substance of messages, but this must be done respectfully, constructively, and with academic insight. Communication and trust is a particular challenge in online environments, and particular attention is required to ensure that the community and working groups maintain a collegial atmosphere if they are to stay collaboratively focused on the task. That is, they remain trustful and identify with the group (maintain goal clarity and group cohesion) to ensure successful completion of collaborative tasks.

Group cohesion is also enhanced through interpersonal relationships. If issues are addressed when they arise, then participants will naturally stay connected and develop interpersonal relationships that will support learning during and beyond the course of studies. Particular attention needs to be given to these issues when working asynchronously online. Resolving relationship conflict is more challenging in virtual contexts (Bierly, Stark, & Kessler, 2009), and direct instructional interventions will be required to ensure effective collaboration. On the other hand, much can be done in the face-to-face environment to mitigate social presence issues that may arise over time. Relationship conflict can be mitigated in face-to-face settings.

Engagement is central to a blended learning experience. The strength of blended learning is the ability to create and sustain engagement in a community of inquiry. Direct instruction must be seen as enhancing academic engagement. At the outset we need to note that sustaining productive discourse and cognitive presence requires the right balance of social presence. Too much social presence can undermine inquiry as much as too little. It is crucial that direct instruction ensures that personal relationships do not inhibit students from challenging ideas and offering constructive alternatives. One thing to watch for is personal/social relationships getting in the way of students providing honest critiques of each other’s work. This may be a particular issue in a face-to-face environment. The converse may be a more likely challenge in a virtual environment.

The opportunity for greater independence and reflection in a virtual environment is an advantage but also a challenge. This raises the importance of direct instruction if we are to ensure open communication (climate/trust), cohesion (focus/collaboration), and the development of positive interpersonal relationships (familiarity with abilities/beliefs). Direct instruction addresses the strengths and weaknesses of face-to-face and online learning dynamics. All of this is directed to resolving problems and enhancing learning outcomes.

Guidelines associated with this principle are to be supportive, but expect students to be self-directed and work collaboratively to complete tasks. From a teaching presence perspective, there will be a stage in terms of group dynamics where tensions and conflicts will arise. It is crucial that the teacher addresses these situations directly and resolves conflicts, by negotiating expectations or correcting a student who is out of line (e.g., using excessive or flaming messages). Students should also feel that they can question the teacher and will be treated respectfully. Team-building activities will give students the opportunity to develop connections and build community support to accomplish the assigned tasks.

Effective educational strategies for this first principle of direct instruction include providing students with opportunities to discuss and clarify expectations, roles and responsibilities of team members through the use of inquiry-based project work guidelines, learning contracts, and assessment activities.

Inquiry-based project work involves a group of students investigating a worthy question, issue, problem, or idea. This is the type of authentic project work that those working in the disciplines actually undertake to create or build knowledge. These projects involve serious engagement and investigation. Two resources that we have found of particular value to guide inquiry-based project work are the Team-Based Learning Collaborative and the Galileo Educational Network.¹

Team-based learning (TBL) involves sequencing individual tasks, group work, and immediate feedback to create an educational environment in which students increasingly hold each other accountable for each other’s learning and academic success. The Galileo Educational Network has developed an inquiry-based project rubric that consists of eight dimensions. The key components and descriptors for this rubric are highlighted in Table 4.1.

TABLE 4.1. Inquiry-based project rubric

Adapted from Galileo Educational Network (2011)

In addition, learning contracts can be a useful tool for helping students to plan and complete inquiry-based project work. These contracts should be constructed by the student and reviewed by the instructor for constructive feedback and suggestions for modification. Both the student and the instructor should sign the final version of the learning contract. The contract then serves as an outline for the project and a tool to aid in the assessment process. Modification of the learning contract may become necessary as the learning experience progresses. Modified contracts should be approved and signed by both students and the instructor. Table 4.2 is an example of a learning contract, adapted from the work of Knowles (1986).

TABLE 4.2. Sample learning contract

Adapted from Knowles (1986)

For an inquiry-based project or activity, it is critical that the assessment techniques are congruent and clearly aligned with the learning outcomes for the course. As demonstrated in the Galileo inquiry rubric (http://www.galileo.org/research/publications/rubric.pdf), an instructor should provide a range of methods and opportunities for student assessment. Chapter 5 will provide specific examples of self-, peer-, and instructor-assessment strategies.

COGNITIVE PRESENCE

The second direct instruction principle addresses cognitive presence issues. This concerns scholarly leadership and is associated with critical discourse, reflection, and progression through the phases of practical inquiry.

PRINCIPLE: Sustain inquiry that moves to resolution

Direct instruction is specifically tasked with ensuring systematic and disciplined inquiry. Sustaining purposeful inquiry includes several overlapping responsibilities. The overriding responsibility of direct instruction is to ensure that participants move through the inquiry phases and that they do so in a timely manner. This was one of the challenges revealed in the early research into the Community of Inquiry framework (Garrison, 2011). In addition to task design deficiencies, it was found that direct instruction was lacking in terms of moving to resolution. Ensuring progression to the resolution phase in the context of collaborative inquiry requires that participants maintain focus on the task and that issues are resolved quickly. While focus and progression are important issues, this should not exclude exploring worthwhile unintended avenues of inquiry. This must, however, be managed in the context of insuring that intended educational goals are achieved.

To ensure developmental progression requires persistent attention to a number of related issues such as diagnosing misconceptions, providing essential content, and offering conceptual order when necessary. At times it may be necessary to renegotiate expectations. Similarly, intervening to address misconceptions and unproductive lines of inquiry in a collaborative and non-authoritarian manner is essential to maintaining participation and cohesion in a community of inquiry. While it is advantageous that participants take on this responsibility, as much as can be expected (remaining true to the essence of the teaching presence construct), inevitably the content and pedagogical expertise of the instructor of record will be required. This must not be abandoned falsely in the name of community. In what may seem a paradox, a successful educational community of inquiry is very much dependent upon direct instruction.

Managing discourse in face-to-face and online environments presents different challenges. In face-to-face discussion, time is a precious element that may demand vigilant monitoring and management depending on the particular task. In plenary discussions, it may be advantageous for the instructor to take a lead role in managing and modeling discourse. In breakout groups, however, participants should be expected to assume greater responsibility for facilitating and directing the discussion. On the other hand, the reflective nature of online discourse may require participants to take a greater role in directing the discussion. This is a great opportunity for participants to develop these essential abilities. This should not, however, be in the total absence of the instructor. In either case, participants need to have some awareness of the goals of the task and the time constraints.

Direct instruction plays an important role in enhancing meta-cognitive awareness and action. Sharing the thought processes of a discipline expert will reveal reflective processes and model discourse. At the outset, students need to be introduced to the inquiry process to increase their awareness of the inquiry process and discuss why it is important to monitor and manage learning.

Akyol and Garrison (2011a) provide a metacognitive construct consisting of knowledge, monitoring, and regulation of cognition contextualized within the Community of Inquiry framework. They also report, “Students became metacognitively mature through explaining, questioning, clarifying, justifying or providing strategies reciprocally within a community of inquiry” (p. 188). Metacognition begins with the knowledge or awareness of metacognition. Monitoring (assessment) and managing (planning) learning requires that students be provided with a conceptual understanding as well as a model of discourse for deep and meaningful thinking and learning. In turn, the likelihood of moving through the inquiry stages will be greatly enhanced when participants have this metacognitive awareness and are encouraged to assume responsibility for developing, monitoring and managing abilities.

Metacognition, however, is challenging in a community of inquiry, as we must consider individual and shared monitoring and regulation. As Akyol and Garrison (2011a) suggest, “Metacognition in an online learning community is defined as the set of higher knowledge and skills to monitor and regulate manifest cognitive processes of self and others [emphasis added]” (p. 184). Metacognition requires feedback and this responsibility must be shared through discourse. This once again points to the collaborative and distributive nature of teaching presence, including direct instruction. Students must be encouraged to explain their thinking and, strategically, how it will facilitate achieving resolution. Practices that can improve metacognitive abilities are peer assessments, collective reflection, and modeling metacognitive processes. Journals may be helpful to encourage students to reflect metacognitively on the learning process. It may also be advantageous for students to monitor and manage topics of discussion formally.

With regard to having students formally monitor their participation in online discussion, several strategies can be utilized by a course instructor. For example, students could be required to use the practical inquiry model to self-code their discussion postings for cognitive presence using the information presented in Table 4.3.

TABLE 4.3. Practical inquiry model for self-coding discussion forum postings

Another strategy is to co-create a discussion grading rubric with the students so that they can self-assess the quality of their postings. Table 4.4 provides an example of a discussion forum rubric that can be used to achieve this goal.

TABLE 4.4. Discussion forum rubric

Adapted from Pelz (2004)

Student-moderated discussions can also be effective for the development of metacognitive skills. Several approaches can be used to ensure that this is a successful learning activity.

First, we recommend that the instructor moderate the first online discussion in a course. This way the instructor can demonstrate, model, and debrief about the expected requirements for a discussion moderator.

Second, it is important to provide students with clear and detailed instructions about their roles as moderator. Table 4.5 provides an example for the moderation of an online discussion about a textbook chapter.

TABLE 4.5. Student-moderated discussion instructions

Adapted from Pelz (2004)

Third, in order to reflect upon and document the learning that took place in an online discussion, we encourage student moderators to create a summary of the discussion. In order to facilitate this process we again recommend the use of the practical inquiry model. Table 4.6 illustrates how this model can be used to guide the development of these summaries and in chapter 6 we will demonstrate how various types of technologies can be used to support this process (e.g., wikis).

TABLE 4.6. Practical inquiry model for online discussion summaries

CONCLUSION

In summary, we must be vigilant that neither too much nor too little direct instruction is present. Too much direct instruction will very quickly discourage participation and reduce proposing new ideas or solutions. Too little direct instruction risks moving to resolution and, like too much direction, will shut down participation and discourse.