FrontEnd or Needs Analysis

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Front-End or Needs Analysis
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Project Beginning

• Your project will begin with analyzing the need
  for an instructional intervention, given an
  existing performance that is deficient, or a new
  skill or knowledge that needs to be taught.
• The first step will be to take a close look at
  what the expected performance is and how current
  performance is not matching it for any number of
  reasons.

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Review

• Before we begin exploring front-end or needs
  analysis, take a moment to review the
  instructional design process as presented in the
  next eight slides entitled Project Process.

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Project Process Report 1, Due Week 5

• After performing a needs analysis, for which you
  will be given some format guidelines, you will
  proceed through the steps in the D C text.
• The second step will be goal analysis where you
  identify what exactly the instructional
  intervention will accomplish.

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Project Process Report 1

• Once having determined the goal, you will
  undertake a detailed analysis of the task or
  tasks involved down to the sub-task level.
• Having completed a task analysis, you will
  conduct an analysis of the learners, the target
  population.
• You will then stop to take a breath and review
  learning theories you have learned and how they
  might apply in your instructional design.

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Project Process Report 2, Due Week 9

• Now having identified the need, the tasks, the
  learners, some learning theories and different
  types of knowledge, you will get down to the
  serious task of writing objectives for your
  instructional intervention.
• Then, having identified objectives, you will
  design assessments that will measure attainment
  of those objectives.

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Project Process Report 2

• With the objectives and assessments in hand, you
  now look at how to attain those objectives
  through your selection of instructional
  strategies.
• Sometimes course work is not the solution to
  performance deficiencies nor is it the only
  solution. We will look at job aids as another
  possibility to enhance performance.

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Project Process

• Major considerations in selecting and writing
  instructional design include the diversity of
  learners in your population. Here we will tap
  into learning styles and intelligences
  considerations.

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Project Process Report 3, Due Week 14

• It is time to outline your instructional
  strategies, including the delivery medium, the
  division of content into manageable units,
  strategies for meeting diverse needs, and levels
  of stimulation appropriate to the population and
  the tasks.

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Project Process

• Having designed and developed the instructional
  intervention and/or job aid you now want to see
  if it is accurate and if it works.
• You will design formative evaluation strategies
  that will include subject matter experts and
  target population members.

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E-Presentation, Due Week 15

• Even though you have shared the progress of your
  project with your small groups and with your
  class, this will be the time to put it all
  together in a presentation. It can take the form
  of an Inspiration-generated storyboard with
  accompanying text or any other innovative idea
  that will communicate the entire project to your
  instructors and class.

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Front-end or Needs Analysis The Why, When, What,
How

• If you dont know where you are going, any road
  will take you there.
• Lewis Carroll in Alices Adventures in Wonderland
  (1865)

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Front-End or Needs Analysis

• When a standard for skills and/or knowledge is
  not being met.
• The cause of the deficiency can be human or
  nonhuman, may be in the cognitive, affective or
  psychomotor domain, and may consist of
  procedural, declarative or conditional knowledge.
• The solution may be in any number of products or
  processes including job aids, coursework,
  practice, motivation, equipment, supervision and
  so on.

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Needs Analysis Why

• Two ends of a project Needs analysis at the
  beginning and formative assessment at the end are
  the two single most important steps in
  instructional design and development.
• A needs analysis seeks to identify existing
  skills and knowledge and then identify necessary,
  missing skills and knowledge.

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Needs Analysis When

• A needs analysis (NA) is conducted in response to
  an existing or anticipated deficiency.
• An NA typically results from a request to a
  curriculum designer, an instructional
  technologist, a teacher, or a subject matter
  expert.
• The NA originates with a perceived need for
  performance improvement.

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Needs Analysis What

• When there is a difference between the actuals
  and optimals, there is a need.
• Mastery Actual Deficiency

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Needs Analysis How

• Review of documentation of optimals
• Review of output/product
• Interviews performer, supervisor, SME
• Observations of performers
• Small group discussions
• Focus groups

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Review Documentation

• Advantages When you review the documentation for
  a performance, for example, a teachers edition
  of a textbook, you can identify mastery.
• Constraints Documentation does not tell you how
  the skills/knowledge were actually taught.
• Methods Read, read, interview subject matter
  experts who wrote documentation.

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Review Output

• Advantages When you look at the product output,
  for example, a math test, you can see what
  learners have mastered and not mastered.
• Constraints You cannot always identify whether
  learners are deficient in all or part of the
  process.
• Methods Item analysis and comparison to
  standards.

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Collect Performer Data

• Advantages You will interview the actual
  learners/performers to determine how they are
  performing.
• Constraints Sometimes performers do not have a
  clear or accurate picture of what they can or
  cannot do.
• Methods Observe, interview, talk to those review
  output.

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Collect Supervisor or Administrator Data

• Advantages They are with the performers most
  probably on a daily basis and are supervising
  them.
• Constraints Administrators or supervisors may
  not know the detail of a performance on a
  performer level.
• Methods Interviews

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Collect SME Data

• Advantages Subject matter experts know the
  performance to mastery.
• Constraints Because they are master performers,
  they may forget some of the developmental detail
  they have already mastered. You must keep asking,
  How do you do that?
• Methods Interviews, observations, documentation
  review.

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Output of a Needs Analysis

• Report Scope and perceived causes of performance
  problem description of mastery performance
• Recommendation/Plan of Action How do you suggest
  this deficiency be addressed? Remember,
  instruction may not be the only solution.

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Steps

• Identify and describe in detail, the performance
  that appears to be deficient.
• Document the mastery level of this performance.
• Identify the cause(s) of the deficiency.
• Recommend a plan or solution.