Analyzing What Makes a Good Instructional Designer

Analyzing What Makes a Good Instructional Designer:

Helpful Dispositions & Habits of Mind for IDT Professionals

What personal attitudes and dispositions enhance the success of instructional designers/developers? Chapter 1 of Streamlined ID states that instructional design is a creative endeavor and involves problem solving. Creativity researchers have identified several personality traits, attitudes, and dispositions that typically underlie creative behavior. Some of these include risk taking, playfulness, sense of humor, openness to new experiences, and freedom, flexibility and originality (Smith & Tegano, 1992; Helson, Roberts & Agronick, 1995). Why do you think these would be important dispositions for an instructional designer/developer? Which of these traits, attitudes, and dispositions—or what some refer to as “habits of mind”—do you possess in abundance, and which do you need to develop further?

The design fields are characterized by problems that do not have immediate and obvious answers. Instructional designers must be adept at solving these dichotomies, dilemmas, enigmas, and uncertainties. Such problems demand strategic reasoning, perseverance, insight, and—you guessed it—creativity. However, being creative and being creatively productive are two different things, and the latter requires the ability to synthesize your ideas, persist in refining them, know your own strengths and weaknesses, and manage yourself effectively throughout the design/development process. Costa and Kallick (2000) identified 16 “habits of mind” that enhance an individual’s ability to creatively produce efficient and effective solutions to complex problems:

1.Persisting

2.Thinking and communicating with clarity and precision

3.Managing impulsivity

4.Gathering data through all the senses

5.Listening with understanding and empathy

6.Creating, imaging, innovating

7.Thinking flexibly

8.Responding with wonderment and awe

9.Thinking about thinking (metacognition)

10.Taking responsible risks

11.Striving for accuracy

12.Finding humor

13.Questioning and posing problems

14.Thinking independently

15.Applying past knowledge to new situations

16.Remaining open to continuous learning

How do you think each of the above “habits of mind” might apply to the work of a creatively productive instructional designer? What other personal attitudes and dispositions do you think would enhance your success as an instructional designer/developer? Create a personal inventory of the above list, along with any other attitudes and dispositions that you think you should strengthen or develop.

References:

Costa, A. L., & Kallick, B. (2000). Discovering and exploring habits of mind. Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development.

Helson, R., Agronick, G., & Roberts, B. (1995). Enduringness and change in creative personality and the prediction of occupational creativity. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 69(6), 1173–1183.

Smith, D.E., & Tegano, D.W. (1992). Relationship of scores on two personality measures: Creativity and self-image. Psychological Reports, 71(1), 43–49.