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ISRD Research Page


Testing Starting in the Fall, 2005	ISRD tested the expert instructional design method used in the CDST software. The testing included assisting a writers and SME with the design of a story-based training curriculum for middle-school math education. Report is pending.

Research Presentation October, 2004	A Model of Expert Practices as the Basis For a Courseware Designer Support Tool (CDST). These slides provide a detailed overview of the CDST research program results. Sponsored by the Office of Naval Research. A short set of briefing slides describing the SBIR study is also available. The CDST Page describes the software tool resulting from this study.

Research Presentation May, 2003	Study of Expert Instructional Designer Cognition View slides presented at a scientific meeting held at Mississippi State University. This is an early presentation of a study that revealed new information about the rational but non-linear pathway followed by expert instructional designers. Sponsored by the Office of Naval Research. The Expert Design Method Page describes the method resulting from this study. A journal article on the study is currently in review.

Research Digest January, 2003	Review of Literature on Instructional Writing. Read our summary of literature related to writing for instructional purposes. Although the literature is drawn from several diverse fields, we found a number of published research reports closely related to the work of writers and educators. Taken together, this literature represents an important group of conclusions about how to write for instructional purposes, as a key instructional design task.

Research Report & Presentation August, 2002; Published 2003	Managing the development of technology-based courses: Success factors from eight government training programs. Read an article reporting a study conducted jointly by ISRD and the Defense Acquisition University, Ft. Belvoir, Virginia. Reference: Bennett, J., Bunker, E. & Rowley, K. (2003). Managing the development of technology-based courses: Success factors from eight government training programs. Acquisition Review Quarterly, 10(1), 76-95. The study was also reported at the 2002 Distance Learning Conference, Madison, Wisconsin. View slides from the presentation.

Case Study April, 2002	Case study of critical design decisions in a blended computer-based (Flash) and classroom course. Read our Article in the April 2002 issue of Performance Improvement about a successful hybrid online/on-site Military Systems Acquisition course that followed a unique story-based experiential teaching approach. This article was also included in ISPI's recent compendium "Instructional Systems Design Revisited" which highlighted important recent articles on instructional design. Reference: Rowley, K., Bunker, E. & Cole, D. (2002). Designing the right blend: Combining online and onsite for optimal training results. Performance Improvement, 41(4), 26-36. The high-level course design and many of the online lessons were written by Kurt Rowley of ISRD. A demonstration of a few of these lessons is available. Click here, and when the demonstration opens, view the Introduction, and/or lessons 1.2, 4.2, or 6.3. For a more complete demonstration, contact ISRD.

Research Report & Presentation May, 2001; Published 2003	Study of a Computer Tutor for Writers. View slides presented at a scientific meeting held at Carnegie Mellon University (adapted for presentation on the web). This study established the effectiveness of a computer-mediated procedural facilitation strategy in teaching complex writing process skills to high school students. Research was sponsored by Air Force Research Laboratory. An article in the Journal of Educational Computing Research presents the results of this study. Reference: Rowley, K. & Meyer, N. (2003). The effect of a computer tutor for writers on student writing achievement. Journal of Educational Computing Research, 29(2), 169-187. The writing software from this study has been converted into a Web-based application, and is currently marketed by Apangea Learning. Click here for Apangea's information page for the Writing Tutor. View a Flash demonstration of the writing tutor.