Breaking Our Own Codes: Designing Instruction for Greater Clarity and Appropriate Control Mark Stoner, Department of Communication Studies Center for Teaching and Learning California State University, Sacramento Co-authors: Steve Higgins School of Education Durham University Diego Bonilla Department of Communication Studies California State University, Sacramento

Session Goals To value the Instructional Design model and tool To use the tool in your own design work To articulate significant heuristics you see in the model and tool

Patterned Human Behavior In instructional contexts Function as Code People attribute meaning

Let’s agree this is an “educational context.” What patterns of behavior do we see? What patterns can we anticipate in terms of roles an the actions of those playing the roles?

Follow-a-thread assignment: a short essay (3-4 pages) that explores, in greater depth, a topic from the readings by digesting two or more relevant citation or citations. (5 points) Assignment may be repeated once. To “follow a thread” is to examine the treatment of a concept or theory across related essays or studies. Your task is to select and read related essays and explain how the concept they jointly treat is operationalized, applied, modified, or critiqued. Remark on what you learn about the nature of our knowledge about the concept treated by various scholars. Essays that score all five points will present some insight rather than just reporting the contents of the studies. Include a bibliography and cite sources in APA (6 th ed.) style. Sample assignment What patterns of instructional discourse do you see? What do you anticipate being most meaningful to students?

Bernstein defines code as “a regulative principle, tacitly acquired, which selects and integrates relevant meanings, the form of their realization and evoking contexts.” (p.109) Bernstein, B. (2000). Pedagogy, symbolic control and identity, rev. ed. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.

3 Instructional Message Systems (that vary among disciplines) Curriculum Relationship of units of content and time allocated Timing of content Time on task Pedagogy Repertoire of strategies for presenting and processing content Allocation of qualification to make knowledge claims Allocation of responsibility for learning Evaluation Predominant type of evaluation Levels of knowledge assessed (à la Bloom) Authenticity of evaluation

These instructional message systems respond to two forms of control: Framing “refers to the controls on the selection, sequencing, pacing and criterial rules of the pedagogic communicative relationship between transmitters and acquirers....” (p.214) Classification “refers to the degree of insulation between categories of discourse, agents, practices, contexts, and provides recognition rules for both transmitters and acquirers for the degree of specialization of their texts.” (p.214) Bernstein, B. (1990). The Structuring of Pedagogic Discourse, Vol IV Class, Codes and Control. London: Routledge.

Framing Classification Reproduction Production Strong Weak

Framing Classification Reproduction Production Communication, Self and Time 1 Communication, Self and Time 2 Strong Weak

Framing Classification Reproduction Production Longair’s alternative design National Physics course syllabus Weak Strong