When innovative instructional designs are too innovative: lack of schema

This paper presents a study of what happens when innovation of an instructional design is too innovative. The study investigates an implementation process of a new instructional design in nursing education. The new instructional design should be a step away for a functionalist approach to learning and it was developed to motivate and encourage the students to engage in more situated learning processes. The course is infamous for low attendance and for demotivating the students; hence the new instructional design should motivate students to attend the lessons and to participate. The new instructional design utilized teacher-produced video clips to qualify the students learning in the preparation for the lessons and new pedagogical activities during lessons to make the learning process more situated. However, the outcome was not as planned. The students didn’t recognize the video clips as a significant part of the preparation for the lessons and therefore they were not prepared for the activities that the teacher had planned for the lessons. The paper investigates the students’ lack of ‘schema’ and suggests ways of developing schemata to learn in a situated learning environment.