Course Description
EME4673 Foundations of Instructional Design is the introduction to a professional field most students have never heard of and many end up working in: the systematic design of instruction — figuring out what people need to be able to do, building something that gets them there, and finding out whether it worked.
The statewide inventory records the course at four institutions, including St. Petersburg College, the University of Florida, the University of North Florida and the University of West Florida.
| Institution | Title | What the entry says |
|---|
| UWF | Foundations of Instructional Design (matches the statewide title) | "Introduces students to the field of instructional design, a systemic and systematic, research-based means of designing effective, efficient, learner focused instruction. Students will use the ADDIE process to design a lesson." School of Education, Department of Instructional Design and Technology, 3 sh. |
| UF | Introduction to Instructional Design | Title confirmed. |
⚠ "Foundations" and "Introduction" are the same course — title drift, not divergence.
⚠ UWF's phrasing repays close reading, because it contains three claims that define the discipline:
- "Systemic AND systematic." ⚠ These are different words doing different work, and the field means both. Systematic = following an orderly process. Systemic = treating instruction as one part of a larger system, so that a change to the training affects the job, the supervision and the organisation around it. Instructional designers are taught to ask whether training is even the right intervention — and frequently it is not.
- "Research-based." The field's claim is that instructional decisions should follow evidence about how people learn, not intuition or tradition.
- "Effective, efficient, learner focused." ⚠ Three criteria that pull against each other: the most effective instruction is rarely the most efficient, and learner preference is not the same as learner benefit. Managing that tension is the job.
ADDIE is the course's spine. Analysis, Design, Development, Implementation, Evaluation — the field's oldest and most widely taught framework, and the one UWF names explicitly.
- Analysis — ⚠⚠ the phase students skip and professionals say matters most. Needs assessment, learner analysis, task analysis, context analysis. The central question is whether there is actually a knowledge or skill gap, because a performance problem caused by bad tools, unclear expectations or no incentive cannot be fixed by training — and delivering training anyway is the field's most common and most expensive failure.
- Design — writing measurable objectives, sequencing content, selecting strategies and media, and planning assessment. ⚠ Assessment is designed here, before the content — because it defines what "learned it" means.
- Development — building the materials.
- Implementation — delivering it, and preparing the environment so it can be delivered.
- Evaluation — formative throughout, summative at the end. ⚠ Kirkpatrick's four levels — reaction, learning, behaviour, results — and the honest point that most organisations evaluate only level one, which measures whether people enjoyed it.
⚠ The field's own critique of ADDIE is part of a good course. It is frequently taught as linear and is almost never practised that way; iterative and rapid-prototyping models — SAM, design thinking, agile approaches — exist because real projects loop. ADDIE is best understood as a checklist of things that must happen, not an order they must happen in.
The learning theory underneath. Behaviourism (objectives, practice, feedback, reinforcement); cognitivism — ⚠ above all cognitive load theory, which is the single most practically useful theory in the field: working memory is small, and instruction that overloads it fails regardless of how good the content is; and constructivism (authentic tasks, scaffolding, learner-constructed meaning). Gagné's nine events of instruction, Bloom's taxonomy, Mayer's multimedia principles and Merrill's first principles all appear.
Learning Outcomes
Required Outcomes
- Define instructional design and describe the scope and history of the field.
- Explain what makes a design process systematic and systemic, and why both matter.
- Describe the ADDIE model and the activities of each phase.
- Compare ADDIE with alternative models — Dick and Carey, SAM, rapid prototyping, agile approaches — and explain when each suits a project.
- Conduct a needs assessment and distinguish a genuine training need from a performance problem with a non-training cause.
- Conduct a learner analysis — prior knowledge, characteristics, motivation, context, accessibility needs.
- Conduct a task or content analysis and decompose a complex skill into components.
- Write measurable learning objectives with condition, observable behaviour and criterion.
- ⚠ Distinguish an objective from an activity or a topic, and use observable verbs rather than unobservable ones.
- Classify objectives using Bloom's revised taxonomy or an equivalent framework.
- Apply learning theory — behaviourist, cognitivist, constructivist — to instructional decisions.
- Apply cognitive load theory to reduce extraneous load in instructional materials.
- Apply Gagné's nine events of instruction to a lesson.
- Select instructional strategies and media appropriate to objectives, learners and constraints.
- Design assessments aligned to objectives, and explain what alignment means.
- Explain formative and summative evaluation and the Kirkpatrick levels.
- Produce a complete design document or lesson plan using the ADDIE process.
- Apply accessibility and universal design for learning principles.
- Explain the professional roles in an instructional design project and how designers work with subject matter experts.
- Explain ethical considerations in instructional design, including honest evaluation and inclusive representation.
Optional Outcomes
- Develop instruction in an authoring tool such as Articulate Storyline or Adobe Captivate.
- Explain learning management systems and standards such as SCORM and xAPI.
- Apply multimedia learning principles in detail.
- Explain project management for instructional design work.
- Explain human performance technology as the broader discipline.
- Design for online and blended delivery specifically.
- Explain learning analytics and data-informed iteration.
- Explain gamification and simulation design.
- Build a professional portfolio.
Major Topics
Required Topics
- The field of instructional design — history, scope, roles.
- Design models — ADDIE and alternatives.
- Needs assessment and performance analysis.
- Learner analysis.
- Task and content analysis.
- Learning objectives and taxonomies.
- Learning theories and their design implications.
- Cognitive load and multimedia principles.
- Instructional strategies and Gagné's events.
- Media selection.
- Assessment design and alignment.
- Evaluation — formative, summative, Kirkpatrick.
- Accessibility and universal design for learning.
- Working with subject matter experts.
- Professional ethics and practice.
- A complete design project.
Optional Topics
- Authoring tools and development.
- Learning management systems, SCORM and xAPI.
- Project management for design work.
- Human performance technology.
- Online and blended design.
- Learning analytics.
- Gamification and simulation.
- Portfolio development.
- Instructional design in K-12, higher education and corporate settings compared.
Resources & Tools
- Standard textbooks: Morrison, Ross, Kalman and Kemp, Designing Effective Instruction — ⚠ the most widely adopted introductory text; Dick, Carey and Carey, The Systematic Design of Instruction — the model's own presentation, rigorous and worth knowing; Smith and Ragan, Instructional Design; Gagné, Wager, Golas and Keller, Principles of Instructional Design for the theoretical foundation.
- ⚠ The two books practitioners actually recommend to newcomers: Julie Dirksen, Design for How People Learn — readable, practical, evidence-based, and the best first book in the field by consensus; and Cathy Moore, Map It, on action mapping and on the discipline of refusing to build training that will not fix the problem.
- On the evidence base: Clark and Mayer, e-Learning and the Science of Instruction — ⚠ the multimedia principles, each backed by experiments, and the most immediately applicable research in the field; Brown, Roediger and McDaniel, Make It Stick, on retrieval practice and spacing.
- Authoring tools: Articulate Storyline and Rise — ⚠ the industry standard and what job postings name; Articulate offers a free student trial and a discounted academic licence. Adobe Captivate; Camtasia for video; Canva and Figma for visual design; Vyond for animation. ⚠ Free and genuinely capable: H5P, Google Slides and Forms, and Genially.
- Learning management systems you may encounter: Canvas (⚠ used by most Florida public institutions, and it has a free instructor account), Moodle, Blackboard, and corporate systems such as Cornerstone and Docebo.
- Professional bodies and free material: the Association for Talent Development (ATD) — ⚠ the main professional home for corporate instructional designers, with Florida chapters that welcome students; the Association for Educational Communications and Technology (AECT) for the academic side; the Online Learning Consortium; and the Quality Matters rubric, which is used across Florida higher education to review online courses and is worth knowing by name.
- ⚠⚠ Accessibility standards are not optional and you will be asked about them: the WCAG guidelines and Section 508. WebAIM's free resources and its contrast checker are the practical tools; CAST publishes the Universal Design for Learning guidelines free.
- ⚠ The portfolio is the credential in this field. Start one in this course. Employers hire on work samples, not transcripts, and a well-documented design project — including the analysis, not just the finished artefact — is the single most useful thing to leave this course with.
Career Pathways
⚠ This is an unusually employable course for an education-adjacent field, because instructional design is not confined to schools — every large organisation that trains anyone employs designers.
- Instructional coordinators and designers (SOC 25-9031) — ⚠ the direct destination. Corporate, government, healthcare, higher education and military.
- Training and development specialists (SOC 13-1151) and managers (SOC 11-3131).
- E-learning developers (SOC 25-9031, 15-1255) — ⚠ the role where authoring-tool skill matters most.
- Learning experience designers (SOC 25-9031) — a newer title, closer to UX practice.
- Curriculum developers (SOC 25-9031) — publishers, education companies, districts.
- Educational technologists and LMS administrators (SOC 25-9031, 15-1244) — every Florida college employs these.
- Technical trainers (SOC 13-1151) — ⚠ substantial Florida demand in healthcare systems (AdventHealth, Orlando Health, BayCare), theme park and hospitality operations (Disney and Universal both run large internal training organisations), aerospace and defence, and the utilities.
- Simulation and training designers (SOC 25-9031, 15-1255) — ⚠⚠ a Florida specialisation. Orlando's Central Florida Research Park hosts the largest concentration of military simulation and training organisations in the country, and instructional design is a named role in it.
- Teachers moving into design (SOC 25-2031 → 25-9031) — ⚠ an extremely common transition, and this course is often where a teaching student discovers the option.
- Higher education faculty developers and online learning staff (SOC 25-9031, 11-9033).
⚠ Practical note on entry. Many instructional design roles ask for a master's degree, and UWF, UCF and USF all run graduate programmes in the field. But the portfolio does more of the work than the credential, and entry through a training-specialist or e-learning-developer role is common and realistic with a bachelor's plus demonstrated work.
Special Information
Prerequisites and who takes it
UWF lists no prerequisite, and the course may not be repeated for credit. It sits in the Department of Instructional Design and Technology within the School of Education.
- ⚠ The 4000-level number is misleading about difficulty. This is a genuine introduction and assumes no prior coursework in the field. Its level reflects where it sits in a degree, not what it presumes.
- Useful preparation, none of it required: an educational psychology or learning theory course supplies the theoretical half; any experience teaching, training or explaining something to someone supplies the intuition; and basic comfort with software makes the development work faster.
- ⚠ The most useful thing to bring is a real subject you know well. The design project needs content, and students who choose something they genuinely understand — a work process, a hobby skill, a course they tutor — produce far better work than students who pick a topic they must research first. Decide early.
⚠ The sequence partner
At UWF this course is followed by EME 4674 "Development of Instructional Materials", which covers "the pedagogical, technical, and logistical aspects of instructional messages" and the fundamentals of instructional development.
⚠ The pair maps onto ADDIE's own split: this course is Analysis and Design; the next is Development. If you intend to work in the field, take both — a designer who can analyse but cannot build is employable only at organisations large enough to separate the roles, and most are not.
Course format and workload
3 credits, 45 contact hours — lecture and discussion, three hours per week; frequently offered online, which is fitting for the subject.
Expect 6–9 hours per week outside class. ⚠ The workload is project-shaped rather than evenly distributed: reading and short assignments early, then a large design project that consumes the second half. Students who start the project when it is assigned rather than when it is due do substantially better, because the analysis phase needs time to be done properly and cannot be compressed.
Assessment normally includes the design document or lesson as the major deliverable, analysis exercises, objective-writing practice, discussion participation, and often a peer review round.
⚠ What students find hardest
- ⚠⚠ Writing genuine objectives. The single most common failure. "Students will understand the safety procedure" is not an objective — understanding is not observable. "Given a spill scenario, the technician will select the correct containment procedure with no errors" is. Condition, observable behaviour, criterion. Expect to rewrite objectives several times, and expect that to feel pedantic before it starts feeling useful.
- Resisting the urge to design first. ⚠ Everyone wants to build the slides. The discipline is to complete the analysis before deciding what to build — and to be willing to conclude that training is not the answer.
- Alignment. Objectives, activities and assessment must match. Teaching one thing and testing another is extremely common in real instruction and is obvious once you can see it.
- Designing for someone else. ⚠ Novices need worked examples and heavy scaffolding; experts are slowed down by both. The expertise reversal effect is real, and the instinct to design what would work for yourself is the trap.
- ⚠ Letting go of learning styles. The idea that people learn better when taught in their preferred "style" — visual, auditory, kinaesthetic — is not supported by the evidence, and this course is often where students first hear that. It is widely believed, it is intuitive, and the controlled studies do not find the effect. What does help is matching the medium to the CONTENT — teach a physical skill physically and a spatial relationship visually, regardless of who is learning it.
- Working with subject matter experts, which is a professional skill: extracting what someone knows when they cannot articulate it, and negotiating scope with someone who wants everything included.
Articulation and transfer
The number EME4673 is used at all four institutions carrying it, so SCNS articulation is clean; only the title varies.
⚠ The practical transfer question is which degree it counts toward. Instructional design sits in different colleges at different institutions — education, communication, or information science — and a course that is core in one programme may be an elective in another. Keep the syllabus and the design project.
Prefix note. EME is educational media and technology; EDF educational foundations; EDG general education/curriculum; EEX exceptional student education; LIS library and information science; ISM information systems management. ⚠ Instructional design courses appear under EME, EDG and occasionally LIS — search by subject rather than prefix.
⚠ A note on teacher certification
This course is not a teacher preparation course and does not lead to Florida teaching certification. ⚠ Certification requires completion of a state-approved preparation programme plus the FTCE — not an accumulation of education-prefixed credits. Instructional design is a separate profession with no licensure requirement, which is part of why it attracts teachers looking to move.
AI Integration
⚠⚠ No field in this repository is being reshaped by generative AI faster than instructional design, and a current course should say so directly.
What is genuinely changing in professional practice:
- Content drafting. First-pass scripts, scenario text, assessment item banks and knowledge-check questions. ⚠ This is real and widely adopted, and it compresses the Development phase substantially.
- Media production. Synthetic voiceover, image generation and translation have made multilingual and narrated e-learning far cheaper.
- Adaptive and personalised delivery — sequencing content by learner performance, which the field has wanted for fifty years and could rarely afford.
- Analysis support — clustering open-ended survey responses, summarising interview transcripts in a needs assessment.
⚠⚠ Where it fails, and the failures map exactly onto what the course is teaching:
- ⚠⚠ Analysis cannot be generated. A model does not know your learners, your organisation, why performance is poor, or whether training is the right intervention. Ask a model to design a course and it will design one — including for a problem that training cannot solve, which is precisely the failure the discipline exists to prevent. The judgement is the job.
- Plausible content that is wrong. Generated instructional material is fluent and can be factually incorrect. ⚠ In safety, compliance, clinical or technical training, incorrect instruction is a liability — subject matter expert review is not optional.
- Generic output. ⚠ The value of good instruction is its specificity to a context — this organisation, this equipment, these constraints. Generated material trends toward the generic, and generic training is the kind everyone clicks through.
- Fabricated research citations. The field is evidence-based and its literature is real; ⚠ invented studies supporting a design decision are worse than no citation.
- Accessibility. Generated material is not accessible by default — alt text, captions, contrast, keyboard navigation and reading order all still require deliberate work.
⚠ AI as subject matter, which belongs in the course. Instructional designers are now asked to design training about AI use, to build AI-assisted learning experiences, and to advise on policy. There is also a genuine research question the field is actively arguing about: if a tool can produce an answer, what should people still be able to do unaided? That is a needs-analysis question, and it is this discipline's question rather than a technology one.
The honest professional framing. ⚠ Generative tools compress Development — the phase that used to consume the most hours — and leave Analysis, Design and Evaluation largely untouched. Those are the judgement-heavy phases, and they are what this course teaches. A designer whose value was building slides is exposed; a designer who can determine what is actually needed, define what success looks like and prove whether it was achieved is more valuable, not less.
Academic integrity. Follow the course policy. ⚠ There is a particular irony worth naming: generating your instructional design project means outsourcing the analysis and design judgement that IS the assignment — and, in a field where the portfolio is the credential, it produces a work sample you cannot discuss in an interview. Submitting generated work as your own violates every Florida institution's policy, and here it also costs you the artefact you came for.