How to design educational technologies? The development of an instructional-model

The potential of design to support learning has been documented for a wide range of ages. In this research we explore the added value of engaging learners in a design process, with a target audience that received little attention in the learning-by-design literature, namely, graduate students in education. Our exploration of student learning is conducted as a design-based research study, with students who participated in national and international, multi-institutional design-courses. Findings indicate that by integrating approaches from the Learning Sciences and the Instructional Systems Design worlds, the instructional model developed in this study supported students to design pedagogically sound educational technologies. An "anchoring stage", in which students shift from philosophical to practical design was found as a crucial stage in student learning. Interpreting the findings in terms of the novice-expert literature, we found that as we refined our instructional model, students were better supported in making expert-like design decisions.