Gagne's Nine Events of Instruction

As a Content Writer, I sometimes need to update myself with the supposedly 'acquired' skills. One such skill is to remember the contribution of Robert M. Gagne, an educational psychologist and a pioneer in Instructional Designing. He devised his theory about the nine events that take place during an instruction. Popularly (at least within the e-Learning circles) known as Gagne's Nine Events of Instruction, this theory explains what goes into an effective instructional strategy.

I know this is one of the first lessons for experienced Instructional Designers. For others, I hope, this may be helpful.

Here is a short description of each of Gagne's nine events:

1. Gain Attention
Always start with auditory/visual stimuli, thought-provoking question, or an interesting fact. Curiosity motivates students to learn. These stimuli serve better than traditional modes because they enable the content to easily get registered in the learner's memory. And it's easy to retrieve than say a BIG paragraph.

2. Inform learners of objectives
I should know what I'm going to read before I start. And I should know what I will be able to do after learning the course. List the learning objectives at the start of every lesson. The objective must be self-explanatory, creating expectancy in the mind of the learner. All your assessment modules and certification must be based on these objectives.

A common syntax used is something like "Upon completing this lesson, you will be able to…".

3. Stimulate recall of prior learning
This is where all our favorite teachers score over the disliked ones. The good teachers give you real life examples so that you can relate the concepts to something practical. Take into account the learner’s personal experience and knowledge relating to the subject of discussion. This enables the learner to store information in long-term memory. Instead of merely explaining the sections of a money order form, you can create a lookalike form, introduce the purpose of the form, provide a scenario, and ask the learner to fill up the form. In an e-Learning environment, this is child's play.

4. Present the content
The course shouldn't look like an unedited movie, leaving it to the learner to make sense out of it. Chunk and organize content so that it makes sense. Add multimedia to enhance learning experience. Use audio, video, and graphics with text.


5. Provide learning guidance
In addition to the content, provide examples, case studies, graphical representations of data, mnemonics, and analogies. Make the presentation more appealing - visually and conceptually.

6. Elicit performance by practice
Make the learner practice the new skill or behavior learned now. Doing this verifies and confirms their correct understanding. And repetition is likely to increase retention. Practice until you perform should be the mantra.

7. Provide feedback
Practice without feedback doesn't make sense. Provide immediate feedback of the learner’s performance. You must provide specific feedback for every possible answer. Concentrate on comprehension and not on scoring during the tutorial. Provide ‘formative feedback’ in the form of additional information and explanations for each correct and incorrect answer.

8. Assess performance
A post test or a final assessment is as important as the instructional module itself. No assistance in the form of feedback or hint this time. Set a benchmark for the learner to achieve mastery. Normally, the level of mastery is achieved by scoring 80% to 90%.

9. Enhance retention and transfer to the job
Create instructional aids such as job aids, references, templates and wizards to aid the learner’s transfer to the job. Focus on performance through course design that enhances retention and hence performance.

You can see all these nine events happening right before your eyes and experience effective eLearning when you're reading a well-constructed e-Learning course. Good luck!