Dr. Chris Show

I'm quite certain that instructional design was not on the minds of the people who originally started describing design thinking but the model's five components mirror the components of quality instructional design quite well.

Those five components are:

1. Empathize

2. Define

3. Ideate

4. Prototype

5. Test

Stanford's d.School has an excellent "Crash Course" in Design Thinking which is a pretty great example of good instructional design in and of itself which can be found at this link.

https://dschool.stanford.edu/resources-collections/a-virtual-crash-course-in-design-thinking

Like all of us, Subject Matter Experts come in all personality types. So what is the best way to deal with the subject matter expert that you have been assigned for your instructional design project? While I find subject matter experts may be described along a continuum of "Don't want to be bothered" to "Don't steal my thunder" a similar approach works in most situations. Show the person you are working with that you value them. That you value their time and their expertise in whatever subject your instructional design project is all about. This simple approach can smooth over many stormy waters. At the extremes, it can be important to be systematically programmed and pull out what you need from a reluctant expert and on the other extreme, it can be important that you show you are not trying to be the hero of the story but instead are trying to be the Obi-Wan to their Luke Skywalker. That you are a resource to make them shine and not take away any of the spotlight.

One of the topics that I haven't covered yet is to ask what do instructional designers do?

Essentially Instructional Designers Design Instruction by:

-Analyzing the work environment

-Identifying Success Criteria

-Determining Pre-training activities

- determine prerequisite skills

- identify learning objectives

-Developing Course Materials

-Developing Post Training Support

-Evaluating Data

-Revising Materials

Other areas of instructional design include:

Project Management

Quality Assurance

Graphic Design

Audio/Video Production

My mother came by today and we ended up going to "Art in the Park" in South Portland Maine where there were 170 fine artists set up in the park. It reminded me of the importance of both keeping ourselves artistically inspired and energized and the importance of having our own practice. So today's topic is a bit of two topics in one day. That importance of being inspired as well as some of the ways I personally use the Apple Pencil which I whole heartedly recommend.

The hype cycle's fifth stage is the plateau of productivity and this is the "boring stage" where the given innovation or technology just is there and is productive and predictable. This is where most of the technologies that we use on a daily basis are and it's also where many of the technologies that we no longer consider technologies can live for a very long time. Later on, innovations and technologies can slide down the "swamp of diminishing returns" and eventually off the "cliff of obsolescence". Again I love these names. But typically innovations and technologies can enjoy a long healthy life on the plateau of productivity. In this installment on the hype cycle I"ll also share where you should likely start investing in an innovation given your tolerance for risk and some extra opportunities at the top of the peak of inflated expectations to do custom work.

The fourth phase of the hype cycle is the Slope of Enlightenment where expectations and excitement start to match the reality regarding a given technology or innovation. This is when you will start to see "off the shelf" versions of the technology and "best practices" become established. For the majority of organizations and individuals, this is the stage where adoption begins to make sense.

The hype cycle's trough of disillusionment is the third stage of the hype cycle. As the name implies this is the stage where people become disillusioned with a new innovation or technology. It can also be seen as a "wakeup call" with respect to the unrealistic expectations that we have regarding new technologies ability to solve every problem and to pay for itself significantly faster than is realistic. There are several opportunities that you can take advantage to when a technology is in the "Trough" essentially these opportunities can be summarised as in not throwing the "baby out with the bathwater," essentially not giving up and scrapping your work and what you have learned. Another opportunity in this stage is for the enlightened technology advocate to start to get those around them onto realistic footing with regards to the technology. This is a time to get practical.

The second phase of the hype cycle is where the hype actually comes in and that's the Peak of Inflated Expectations. This is the phase where excitement and attention and novelty and the fear of missing out all work together to create this disconnect from reality. Skills instructional technologists and instructional designers can see this disconnect and leverage it in two ways. They can coach clients on the realities of the technology and help those who can handle the risk get in early and they can coach clients on the disconnect and the risks so that those organizations that couldn't survive the risk don't bite off more than they can chew. This is also a spot on the hype cycle where you can pad your portfolio with the "cutting edge" for extra visibility.

There are five stages to the Hype Cycle, the innovation trigger, the peak of inflated expectations, the trough of disillusionment, the slope of enlightenment, and the plateau of productivity.

Today I wanted to continue our talk about the hype cycle with a bit of a discussion about the first stage. The Innovation Trigger. What is the innovation trigger? And what should we do with technologies or innovations that are at the innovation trigger stage?

Today I wanted to share a quick introduction to The Hype Cycle which is an excellent way to explore and describe new innovations and predict their reception (among other traits). It's also an excellent way to identify if a specific new technology is worth your time and how you should be interacting with it at a given point in time. We'll explore a bit more and go deeper over the next few days.