THE EFFECTS OF COMPUTER-ASSISTED INSTRUCTIONS
"Computer-assisted instruction" is a much-debated topic in educational circles, and there is a reasonable amount of confusion concerning just how efficacious the term is. Part of the difficulty lies in the expansiveness of the subject itself, since CAI can range from simple "click here" programs designed to teach color and word identification to pre-schoolers to complex interactive anatomy software designed for medical students.
At issue, also, in this term is whether the CAI is as effective as the normal verbal/oral/human teaching paradigm, or is, in fact, more efficient. This proposal details a testing method to solve some of the issues inherent in this question, and the information provided herein will be organized as follows. An Introduction will provide a brief literature review. That will be followed by a methods section that details the proposed methodology.
A great deal of cross-disciplinary academic literature discusses the benefits or negative aspects of teacher-centered instructional methods, which emphasize memorizing facts and completing traditional exercises that lead to foregone conclusions (Blake, Norman, Keane, Mueller, Cunnington, & Didyk, 1996; Kulik, Bangert, Williams, 1982).
Tulving & Schacter suggest that most students are exposed only to fragments of any particular subject because concepts are carefully divided among the traditional academic disciplines. In addition, many students perceive the information presented in their classes to be irrelevant to their lives (Flanagan & Blick, 1991).
By contrast, integrating current computer technology into student-centered educational procedures has been argued to be more effective in enabling recall (Kulik, Bangert & Williams, 1982), in fostering problem-solving abilities (Moeser, 1978), and in motivating the student toward further self-directed learning (King & Just, 1991). Recent advances in compu...