21 Jan 98 Ernie Franklin - Instructional Technology Forum ...

23 Jan 98
Joe Beckmann
One can define words, but one cannot always define the ideas they represent. Instruction is a
phenomenological concept: it continues to evolve in the head of the learner or in the dynamic of the
group beyond what the teacher, leader, or technologist intended. We can reasonably have expectations
that evolution may include data which are part of the activity, but we cannot anticipate all the
consequences, nor that those data will recur at totally predictable intervals for a perfectly adequate
evaluation, nor that such an evaluation is even appropriate, since most of those data are bound to be
surrounded by the "fuzzy" concepts of who, where, how, when, and self.
Since instruction is phenomenological (reflecting a transaction with and transformation of rather than a
transmission of data) the more "specific" subset of instruction we intend to express with "instructional
technology" remains an event rather than a concrete object. This is why, earlier in this Forum, I argued
that "reality" is also phenomenologically derived and that any process of instruction, with or without any
kind of technology, is a dynamic, multi-dimensional transaction rather than simply placing a lump of
"knowledge" in the "head" of a "student." One can measure such lumps, and even test to see if they got
where we wanted them to get, but we can't know much about how, if, when, where, why, or other factors
about their real meaning to students or to ourselves. If "reality" were a simple truth of being "out there,"
we could ignore such factors. It isn't. Positivists among us can argue 2 + 2 = 4, but even those positivists
must recognize times when the whole is larger than the sum of the parts. If anyone doubts, (ironically
and pointedly) that's the nature of reality (doubt included, that is).
Practically, these "deep definitions" are like Poole's "Deep Subjectivity" or Merleau-Ponty's
"Phenomenology of Perception," or like Foucault's "archeology of knowledge." Practically speaking,
instructional technology is using stuff to make ideas appear in many places, and like others, it is a form
of training. But that "stuff" ought to make more than the original idea appear each time, or we haven't
learned anything, and that's why the practical is very different from the real.
Is this too oblique?
[quoting Kost, 22 Jan 98] By the way, at a cocktail party I just fall back on telling people "I'm a
Trainer." It's just more practical.
Joe Beckmann
E-mail: oekosjoe@ix.netcom.com