Jay A. Young King's College
Both Can Benefit, Student and Teacher
Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania
Programed instruction is only one more tool for the teacher. I t is not the answer to all our teaching problems. However, the effectiveness of programed instruction as a teaching tool is enhanced by a second, outstanding characteristic-its utility as a device for the self-improvement of the teacher who prepares a few programs of his own. This theme, programed instruction i s useful to the teacher as a means of self improvement, can perhaps best he demonstrated by mentioning two key words, followed by an elaboration of their application within this context. The words are control and order. Presented at the Symposium on Programed Instruction at the 124th meetine of the American Chemical Society. Atlantic Citv. New Jersey, September, 1962.
Most teachers agree that, if learning is t n occur, a rather rigid, though friendly, control of the student is necessary. A major problem has been to exercise this control. By what might he called a psychological subterfuge, programed instruction can control the student, at least to a remarkable degree. However, control by itself is insufficient. The knowledge to he imparted must be presented in an order which is communicahle to the student. This, really, is the point. By the use of programs which the teacher himself has prepared for his own students, the teacher learns how to present information in an orderly manner which is communicable to the student. To illustrate this, refer to Figure 1, which is a portion of a program intended to help students comprehend
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the concept of concentration. This type of programed instruction is a linear program. A linear program consists of a series of brief (usually) expository statements, in which the student is subtly interrogated as he procedes, i.e., he fills in the blanks. The student is led in a direct linear manner from t,he initial to the concluding statement. An intrinsic program, as is described in detail in a following paper in this symposium, consists of a series of pairs of exposition-question sets. Each of the several direct questions which is used in such a program is intrinsic with the exposit,ionwhich precedes the question.' Both types have t.heir particular areas of use and their vigorous proponents. Bot,h linear and intrinsic techniques can be used; many of the best recently produced programs include both features, although one or the ot,her will predominate. To clarify the discussion, however, t,he example used here will illustrate only the linear technique. Paragraph, or "frame," number 43 is read by the student, and the single missing word is supplied by him. While reading the frame, the student covers the answer printed in the margin. After supplying what he t,hinks is the correct word, the answer is uncovered; and t,he student learns whether he is, or is not, correct. The student procedes in a similar manner with each of the following frames. If the student cannot think of a word or words to fill the blank, he may look at the answer in the margin and then proceed. Because students are not, in a properly prepared program, challenged beyond their ability-though they may indeed be challenged, they do not t,end to look a t the answsr in the margin without first attempting to determine their own answers. Students quickly recognize that they are only cheating themselves when they look at the answer without first attempting to determine their own answers. Since no grade is ever given for a good or a poor answer, there is little temptation to use the program incorrectly. Whenever the student cannot supply the word or synonyms to t,he word printed as the correct answer, the author of the program has failed because he was not thinkmg along the same lines as the student. A program is, quite literally, a test in which the student supplies answers. But if the student supplies an answer which differs from that of the author of the program, it is the author who is wrong, not the student. This &dent is no longer under the control of the program writer. Typically when this occurs, the author has, in some prior frame or two, failed to set the stage so that what he had to say in the following frames was communicable to the student. Sooner or later, the student will run off the track of the argument and fail to learn. All of us have had this experience while studying from a text or reference work. When studying material which is difficult t,o comprehend, we think as we study; and, agreeing with the logic of the textbook author's statements, we proceed sentence by sentence. Then, abruptly, we discover that-in the middle of a paragraph-we can no longer identify our agreement with the author's statemcnts. Somehow, perhaps in the ' S e e following papers in This Symposium, THIS JOURNAL, 40,14-28(10G3).
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preceding sent,ence, perhaps in a sentence three pages back, we got the wrong impression, and t,his now arises to render communication difficult. In such a case, of course, the scholarly student will back up and re-read the preceding pages unt,il he finally ident,ifieshis misunderstanding. Then, with this clarified, with communication once more well est,ablished, he proceeds with his study. Wit,h few exceptions, t,hisis not the way college freshman students study their text. Although the text may indeed be one of the best available, there will be places in it where the student fails t,o understand what the author meant for him to understand. Since the beginning student does not recognize this, he will not always know what to do in order t,o clarify the matter. Figure 1 supplies a specific illustration of the means by which programed instruction avoids this difficulty. Refer, for example, to frame number 48. Suppose that you have volunteered to study this program, which I have just written a few hours ago, to help me find the places where I have faiied to communicate. You have gone t,hrough the first forty-seven frames easily, but you cannot, from what you have learned thus far, even with diligent reflection, think of a word (or number) which will fill the blank in frame 48. Or, you have thought of a word but on checking the marginal answer find that we disagree. As the author of the program I have failed to communicate. It is up to me, by discussing t,he matter with you in an informal way, or by judging from the word you did supply, to determine where I failed to communicate with you. Suppose that I determine that I gave you the wrong impression back in frame 27. Before I give this program to another volunteer, I will revise the program beginning with frame 27, and also revise frames 28, 29, and so on, as I think necessary, until the error I have made is presumed to he corrected. Then, if the second volunteer now gets by frame 48 without incident, I have communicated, a t least for volunteer number two. By trying out the original version on a few students, noting where I made mistakes, and what kind of wrong words the student wrote in those frames, by revising the program to remove these difficulties, and finally by giving the student,^ an examination I learn that for these students I have written a program which mill teach because it does communicate. The major point is what happened to the teacher who wrote the program. That teacher had a unique experiThe cover
The busy professor (note the stack of papers!) is alsa uuszled. On the desk bf Mr. Gordon E. Highrirer r l i King's Cdlcgc are sprc;~dout d l t h e programs currentlv in print irr teaching chcrnistry. Also available is the standard reference book in the field, Lumsdaine and Glaser. Photograph by Are Hoffman Studios-Wilkes-Barrc, PennsylV R ~ ~ R .
ence! He found that some of his favorite explanations were not understood and that some of his previous students have learned in spite of what he did. But more than this, he now knows precisely where he erred in his presentation. He has tried, by the successive revisions, to express himself to the students in a new and better way. If he persisted in his efforts, he now knows how to explain concepts in this one area more clearly to his future students. This knowledge makes the effortworth while. But even more remarkable and pleasine is a further bonus. All who have prepared programs in the manner outlined here have discovered that there is a mode of expression, an order of presentation, an effective contml of the student as he thinks, which is communicable to the student in other situations. To put it differently, every teacher who tries diligently to prepare a few successful programs for his own students finds that he has learned how to express ideas in an understandable manner to his students in all of his contacts. I cannot put this too strongly: if you would like to learn to improve your ability to teach students, then write a few programs in the manner described. You will be both amazed and pleased with the results. In actual practice you need not revise your programs so finely that every student correctly answers every frame. There are some subtle arguments which indicate that it is desirable at times to allow the student to answer incorrectly, provided that this is anticipated and corrective steps have been t,akenin following frames. The proper preparat,ion of programs is time-consuming. Many of the speakers a t this symposium have prepared programs for their own students and some of them are now, or soon will be, available from publishers. However, no teacher will profit as much as he should, or could, using only programs prepared by another. No teacher should attempt to prepare program for his students armed only with what he learns from this symposium. A list of useful references for the beginner is included in the f o o t n ~ t e . ~ Some have heard that programed instruction is good
for drill material, such as the learning of oxidation numbers or symbols of the elements, but that it is not well-suited for other purposes. My experience has shown that programed instruction can best be used to teach principles and comprehension of ideas, and that it is not well-suited for the mere presentation of information to be memorized. Dr. Benfey will elaborate upon these remarks in his discussion. I have purposely avoided mentioning mechanical devices called "teaching machines." At least at the upper high school and freshman college levels, mechanical devices are not essential for most applications. They are not harmful, but they are cumbersome. Programs present information in very small steps. At first inspection a sample program may appear to be too simple. Do not be misled; unless a program does indeed offend by its simplicity and the care which it takes to spell out details which are quite obvious to any competent teacher, it is likely to he a poor program. Because of this apparent simplicity, it might also seem that students who use programs will tend to lean on them as though they were a crutch, and will become less able to use ordinary text material. I have found the contrary to be true. When programs are used as adjuncts to a good text in elementary chemistry, the students tend to be weaned away from the programed instructions rather quickly. They learn from the examples set by the programs how to extract information from a text for themselves. One might say that, a t last, they have learned how to read intell&ntli, while asking questions of the author and providing their own answers. See DAY,J. H., J. CHEM.EDUC.,39, 50 (1962); 36, 591 (1959) and the Literature Cited therein; YOUNG, J. A., J. CHEM. EDUC., 38,463 (1961); and I,UM~DAINE, A. A., A N D GLASER, It., editors, "Teaching Machines and Programmed Learning," Department of Audio-Visual Instruction, National Education Association, Washington, D. C., 1960, especially pp. 401-5, 48G96; STOLUROW, L. M., "Teaching by Machine,', U. S. Office of Education, HEW, Supt. of Documents, Washington J. W., AND FRY,E. B., Audio-Visual 25, D. C., 1961; RIGNEY, Commtmieaiion Review, 9, no. 3, 1061.
43. It is not enough to know what we know now, the way to calculate concentrations. We must also be able to make solutions, in the laboratory, that have a known concentration.
For example, a chemist wished to prepare 250 ml of a 0.12 molar solution of potassium bromide. (Since this is an ionic compound, some chemists would say that the concentration of this solution would be 0.12 .) formal, or, F 44. How would this solution be prepared? First, we know that a certain quantity, which we shall have to calculate, of potassium bromide should be weighed on a balance. Then this weighed quantity will he dissolved in a suitable amount of water, and, with thorough stirring, 250 more water added until the total volume of the solution is ml. The question is, of course, how many grams of potassium bromide do we need? 45. The desired concentration is 0.12 molar. Writing this as a fraction, with a 1.00 in the 0.12 mole of KBr denominator, we have 1.00 1 46. But we want only mi of solution. 250 47. Or, expressed in liters, we want 1of solution. 0.250 48. Therefore, if we multiply the numerator and the denominator of the fraction, in frame 0.250 45, b y , we will have the proper volume, 0.250 1, in the denominator and the number of males in the numerator will be the correct number of moles of potassium bromide for our 250 ml of solution. 0.030 male of KBr 49. Carrying out this multiplication, we have, for our new fraction: 50. So, we need to weigh out -mole of potassium bromide (or correctly, we need t o g formula weight, since potassium bromide is a n ionic compound) for our weigh out solution.
0.250 1 0.030 0.030
Figure 1 . Eight consecutive framer selected from a progrom on the concept of consentrotion.
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