I have been reading a lot about Instructional systems design (ISD) as of late (see Dick and Carey for more information on this model). My primary focus has been on the cost/benefit of developing software and application for re-usability.
While this might seem mundane or boring, this has a very important impact on the work that I do. Building learning objects that are reusable and easy to maintain have far reaching effects on the ability and effectiveness of instruction. While much of the literature that I have been reading has stressed the importance of creating reusable learning objects, I have been attempting to include these concepts into code generation.
My main focus has been on the cost effectiveness of creating learning objects that can easily be modified and maintained by the direct subject matter experts (SME). This has shifted some of my focus away building highly unique programs, and moving more towards applications that can be easily maintained by end users.
The main benifit, in my mind, is that once I have developed an application that can be modified and maintained by a SME, I can be removed from the process. This is a significant time and money saver as the expense of employing a programmer to make small modifications is very costly and time consuming.
An additional benefit that I have observed is that when the modification and alteration of the applications is left to the SMEs, the application are adapted and used in more specific ways.
I plan to post more on this subject once I gather my thoughts and have some examples to show.
