Instructional Design and Media

Reiser excludes the teacher, chalkboard, and textbook from the definition of instructional media for the purpose of clarity during the discussion of the history of instructional media.  This is primarily, I believe, due to the fact that throughout history, the term "instructional media" has applied a very narrow scope.  This point is exemplified by a point that I made in a previous post concerning the definition of "instructional technology" wherein I stated that I believe that many educators today make the same mistake and focus on specific and burgeoning technologies when defining instructional technology.  When this occurs, the definition takes on a hyper-narrow focus and ceases to take into account the systems and processes which are germane to the subject.  Throughout history, the definition of instructional media has changed each time a new technology has been identified for the purpose of use in instruction, whether it was motion pictures, radio, or computers.  With each iteration of the definition, the standard elements (the teacher or instructor, the chalkboard, and the textbook) are forgotten to exist entirely.  Reiser actually states that these elements should be included in the definition, but excludes them for argument sake.

I believe that these 3 core elements are certainly components which can be defined as instructional media.  Actually, I think instructional media can encompass just about anything which can be utilized to bridge the information for which the lesson or ID is focused on to the learner.  This means that in a given situation with a given topic, instructional media may include any number of bizarre and unimaginable resources.

Given this perspective of instructional media, I would say that the goal of ID is not to incorporate media into instruction, but rather to design instruction which is capable of utilizing and leveraging for the benefit of the learner, myriad media resources if needed.  I suppose my hesitation in stating that the goal of ID is to incorporate media into instruction is that if that precise statement is made, some may robotically seek to accomodate the precise definition, becoming entangled in "stuff" or resources, specifically, rather than focusing on the goal and process of the instruction.