Welcome to the History Makers Project. Could you please
introduce yourself for us? Sure. I'm Robert Reiser
, I'm Associate dean for research in the College of
Education at Florida State University and I was a professor
in the instruction systems program there For over 35 years
. That's wonderful. Can you tell us a little
bit about your career path? Where did you start
? Sure. I started my graduate training at Arizona
State University and the instructional technology program there and immediately
upon completing that back in 1975, I think how
long ago it was? Um I got a position
at Florida State and thought I'd be there three years
And here it is, about 36 37 years later
and I'm still there and I've changed some of my
positions at Florida State, but I've remained at that
university. So you were there for with some pretty
big names in our Oh, sure to work with
walt dick bob, can you bob, morgan bob
, Branson, and roger Kaufman. Those are some
of the people who preceded me. And then of
course over the years we had another great names like
more seat risk, what wager, john Keller.
So it was really a pleasure to be working such
big names in the field all these years now.
Let's go back just a little to Arizona. Who
was your mentor there? Sure Howard Sullivan, he
was my major professor there and he along with wilted
with two major mentors to me throughout my career,
Howard taught me how to be a good researcher,
had to write up research. Great right um helped
hold my riding skills, how to be an effective
instructional designer, learned a lot of my instructional science
skills from Howard and still friendly with Howard to this
day, we keep in touch regularly. Then once
I got to florida state and joined the faculty Baltic
really became my mentor there with his design background and
his straight arrow personality. Give me a task and
I'll do it, served as a really a good
role model for me throughout my career and walt and
I work together friday books, articles, projects and
he and I are still friends to the state.
In fact he and I presented here at this conference
. That's exciting. Tell us a little bit about
some of the situ had written uh Four books.
The first book I wrote was selecting media for instruction
. That was back in the 80s when the media
that we had was quite different in the media available
today and bob daniel and I wrote that book together
, bob and I were working on a project for
the Army Research Institute helping design instruction that would enable
army officers to design instruction and use the appropriate media
design that instruction and the result of that project.
We came with the media selection. Then he and
I wrote a book that time. That was the
first book I wrote. Uh later on working with
Wolf Dick, I realized that the systematic design of
instruction book he had written with Blue Carry, which
was an excellent book, was like most likely too
detailed for teachers. And I always felt that teaching
teachers how to use instructional design would be a very
valuable thing to do. So walt and I worked
together on designing a very simplified version of that book
for teachers. I think the first edition that was
called planning effective instruction. We were happy with the
book, but it didn't get the use that we
thought so several years later we completely redid the book
still focusing on instruction sign for teachers. I think
it was then called instructional planning a guide for teachers
And that was the third book and then most recently
and I've been doing this for now. Over 10
years. I have worked on transit issues and instructional
design and technology with a former student of mine,
Jack Dempsey was the university of South Alabama that got
started because when I was teaching at a florida state
and Jack was a student in my classes. I
use a lot of journal articles, recent journalism to
inform students about recent practices in our field. And
about 10 years after Jack graduated from the Perm said
bob instead of getting new resources every semester in finding
journal articles, how about if we put together a
book on trends in our field And having been in
the field so long? I knew a lot of
the big names in the field and was able to
call on them to write chapters on the various areas
in which they had expertise. So in 2002,
the first edition of that book came out, it
proved to be pretty popular. We did a 2nd
edition in 2007. And the third edition with 2012
. Copyright just came out recently. In a matter
of fact, just won the DND Outstanding Book Awards
. I'm really proud of that book and I intend
to do 1/4 edition in the not too distant future
. Well, tell me what was the primary focus
of your work uh in your research? Wow.
Over the years? It changed in so many ways
. Uh, you know, some people keep the
same research agenda for many years and go into it
depth. Maybe the entire career I've kind of jumped
around. I started out When I was first the
doctor soon and then mostly the 1st 10 years of
my career, once I became a finger focusing on
mastery learning how we can get the range instructional conditions
that most of our students master the skills that they're
taught. So I worked on that for about 10
or 12 years, there was a need 70s through
the mid 80s. Then when my kids came along
, my research interests turned to things that were kind
of relevant to young Children. So for example,
a lot of research on what Children can learn from
Sesame Street and how we can have parents interact with
kids as they're watching Sesame Street, so as to
help them learn more. And then it's, my
kids started getting into computer based instruction and games.
I started looking at how we can evaluate the instructional
effectiveness of computer based instruction and well, Dick and
I created a model for evaluating instruction effectiveness of computer
based instruction uh and examine how effective some games have
reported to be very effective work or not. So
we worked on that for a number of years and
so you would you would say that your focus has
evolved over time. Yeah. You know, if
you had a character is my research injured, I
think I'm really interested in coming up with practical solutions
to real world problems, more of a applied research
focus and a basic research records. And I think
the areas I discussed with you will fit in that
marina. That's that's very helpful for the field.
Now, how did you get interested in this field
? Maybe your undergraduate? Did you? Sure.
Yeah. I originally thought I'd be a classroom teacher
but interestingly when I was student teaching, one of
the problems that I found was I was spending powers
designing a single lesson. Little did I know that
my whole career would end up doing, doing that
very thing designing instruction. So I decided you know
, I'd like to stay in the classroom but maybe
not be a classroom teacher. So I thought maybe
I'd become a slide library media specialist and I applied
to a number of programs to major in that area
and one day I got a call from Arizona state
, they had a joint school library media instructional design
program. And the professor there who is the head
of the program's name is very in Gerlach called and
said you know we've looked at your records and we'd
really like you to join the perm but we'd like
you to be in the instructional design area, I
had no idea what instructional design was I asked for
and so what structural designers do. And he said
to me, well you know, Our graduates working
three areas. Some of them go into academia,
some of them go into business and industry and some
of them go in as civilians working for the military
. So that's pretty good. I'll consider that when
I got out there I found that they only had
three graduates wanted going into each of the three areas
. So I kind of fell into the field.
But once I got out there, the Arizona state
and started taking courses and instructions on it. So
that it was a really good for me because it
seemed to me that be a good instructions on you
have to be systematic. You have to be organized
things that I am compulsive. Let's have to be
creative to be a good instructional design. You can't
just do very basic boring instruction. And those are
all things that I both towns that I had a
pretty good, right? So given those sets of
personal characteristics and the characteristics needed to be successful and
stretched, it seemed to be a good fit and
it's worked out really beautiful for me. Well,
I have to tell you just a real quick story
that when I came down and I was interviewing some
of the students at florida state. One of the
I think was one of the Coast Guard students said
that dr research really walks the talk and he said
that guy is a living example of what he's teaching
. And he said, and at the end of
class he always sits down and writes out what went
right and what were you like that? That's true
. You really impressed? Well, that's nice to
hear. I really always try very hard to practice
what I preach. And I often we get feedback
to that effect made me work even harder to do
that. That's great. Thanks for sharing. Sure
, Sure. How would you describe your research interests
and aspirations and how they were at the beginning of
your program of your career and how they've changed over
time. Sure. One thing I've always been interested
, as I said earlier was doing practical research and
I've talked about how my research is going to be
practically focused. Another aspect of my job that I've
always enjoyed and this was an aspiration for my first
uh this field was to be a good teacher and
I've really worked hard fine tuning my teaching skills so
that I am effective teacher and that the students learn
a lot of my classes and enjoy something. That's
been something I continue to work on to this very
day. My wife often says me bob, you've
been teaching a course for of course for 32 years
while you're staying up, you know, revising it
tonight. Well, it's just me because I want
to do the job in the classroom. Another thing
that I've really enjoyed, I didn't know this at
the beginning of my career was taking leadership positions in
organizations. I was program leader, the instructional systems
program for six years. I was department share for
nine years now I'm associate dean for research and I
really enjoyed when I have the opportunity to move an
organization of program forward in a certain direction. I
really enjoy doing that and seeing the fruits of my
labor, how the program becomes better, how the
department becomes better helping people in those organizations. Is
that something that wasn't initially an aspiration of mine,
but once I got into leadership roles, I really
started enjoying that as well. Sounds like you were
moving people forward in their careers. Yeah. Yes
, definitely. Yeah, and I really like that
now. What were some of the major ideas or
approaches that stimulated your professional growth? Sure. You
know, I've always felt that the notion of being
very clear about your goals and objectives are is really
at the heart of our field. If you know
where you're going, then you can plan how to
get there. So that's been something that's underlying all
my, my teaching, a lot of my research
to know what I'm trying to accomplish, then make
taking on activities that enable me to accomplish that a
related notion is instructional alignment. The need to make
sure that the things you're teaching are designed to help
students acquire specific outcomes and I really work hard to
see that I'm not giving students unnecessary stuff that I'm
teaching, the things they need and require certain skills
. It's also important to motivate your students. So
I worked very hard to create enjoyable activities that will
help my students obtain the goals. They have another
key concept in our field that underlies a lot of
my work. Again, this is mostly with regard
to my teaching, is the whole notion of formative
evaluation, which is a fancy word for trying it
out. Yeah, gathering some data as to whether
it works not And then revising accordingly. And as
I said earlier and I could be teaching a course
for 30 years. I can still go into a
classroom not get it right, but then take what
didn't go well and revise it to make it better
the next time. The last thing that's been real
important, I think in my professional develop is being
a good listener, is an instructional designer. You
really have to listen to what the other person we
all enjoy talking, enjoying that right now actually,
but also being a good listener, hearing what the
other person says and then be able to record that
and use that information to help design better instruction.
Plus you gain the person's um confidence when when you
when they realize that you're listening to what they have
to say. So those are some of the values
or ideas that have geared my practices in this field
and you you mentioned your work with making sure that
students get what the skills that they're going to need
um that kind of flows into your work on competencies
. Can you talk about a little of your involvement
in in that room? Sure, yeah. For
the past six years, been out of it for
about a year now, I was involved with skippy
, the international Board of Standards for training performance and
instruction. I think I got that right. And
what we did during that period least what I did
during that period is work to revise the list of
skills, instruction design or competencies, instruction diners need
to be effective the field. We just recently finished
that work about a year ago. It will be
published soon and its entire new list of competencies needed
by instructional designers and the absurdity competencies. Previous editions
have been very widely accepted and we're hoping that will
be the case this set of competencies as well and
they're used pretty much across all different careers. Yes
. Yeah that's that's right. Business and industry military
where they have people working instruction design, certainly higher
education academic programs geared their standards based upon the stiffy
competency. So yeah, it's had a pretty good
impact. I'm hoping the next additional do the same
now. What were some of the most important trends
that you felt were going on during your career?
Well of course early in my career was really an
average the notion of mastery learning and how we can
design instructions that most students will acquire the skills we
want them to. And I think a lot of
those concepts are still relevant today, even though we
don't hear the term mystery learning use very much today
. Um But you know it's interesting rather than talking
about new technological innovations and so on which you all
have had positive impacts upon our field. I like
to always go back to the instructional design basics.
I think the whole notion of being very clear about
where you're going and making sure that your instruction is
designed to help your students get their regardless of the
medium that you use is really the key to success
in our field. So I'm happy to note nutrients
and I feel I have a book insurance in the
field, but I think it's those basics that set
of structural designers, part from people who just media
professionals. I mean they play an important role but
without good instructional design, uh the use of media
is not going to make that much of a difference
. Also motivational activities. I think it's really important
for us this instruction science to design, construction is
motivating, that's creative that will excite our learners and
make them want to learn. So my goal is
to get learners acquire the skills you want them to
acquire and to enjoy it while they're learning those skills
. And it's by being very clear about my goals
and aligning my instruction to my goals that I'm able
to do that. Um what do you think of
some of the more recent trends that have been coming
out in the field? Well, certainly, uh
in the past 10 years, online learning has had
a major impact on our field. We're offering many
more of our courses online, not just us in
our profession, but it, All areas of higher
education now, even K 12, a lot of
online courses. So I think that's a very important
trend. I have some concerns about him as well
, and that's the role that the instructor plays in
the online courses, particularly in higher education. I
think an instructor to hire a, in an online
course needs to work hard to make sure that not
only the students interact with one another, but the
instructor provides good feedback and information to the students because
it's the instructor oftentimes has the knowledge and skills that
need to be conveyed. And I've noticed at least
in some courses, a tendency on instructors to kind
of lay back and let the students interact with another
without providing the feedback and guidance to enrich the experience
. So I think online learning is a very important
trend when that's really open up education to people who
aren't able to get it before. I think we
really need to be very careful about designing interesting online
courses courses that promote a lot of interaction, but
not just interaction among students, but among students along
with faculty now, who are some of the people
you needed to, you who are some of the
other people that over the course of your career have
impacted your growth. And sure, well, as
I said earlier, the two, the two major
uh, mentors in my career, first, Howard
Sullivan was a student to this day in walter dick
. But in addition to that, I was so
fortunate to end up in florida state because there was
so many well known figures there, all of whom
were just wonderful to me, bob morgan who was
the head of the florida state instruction system for one
actually brought all those big names to florida state was
the person who originally hired me at florida state uh
, as an instructional designer actually that was part time
faculty, mainly as instruction design and bob was really
instrumental in giving me the opportunity to move forward.
In fact, I have a name professorship now and
it's robert M morgan professor of instruction systems named after
bob family. The other figure of questions, bob
canyon had an office right across from bob daniel.
I couldn't believe after having read about him so much
in all my courses that here I am in the
same office suite with bob and I remember the first
time bob came into my office and said, well
, really? So why do you think about this
? They actually asked me a question, I remember
going home to my wife and say you're not gonna
believe this bob gagne, asked me a question today
about our profession. And so uh bob was a
wonderful mentor. We work together on this book,
selecting media for instruction. He asked me to write
a book. This was in the late Jimmy,
a book chapter in the late 1980s on the history
of our field. He had a book called instructional
technology foundations, I believe the name was. And
he was getting all these big names in the field
to write for him and he had only been out
maybe 8, 10 years. And he came in
to me one day and said bob, would you
like to write a chapter for the book on the
history of the field? I said probably lived this
history. But you know, I I learned a
lesson there because I took I was reluctant, but
I took on the task and I tell my students
this all the time. You know, sometimes you're
given something, she thinks a very steep challenge for
you, but take it on because I can read
great benefits. And you know, as a result
of bobby asked me to do that. I've kind
of become kind of one of the historians of the
field. It was all because of bob giving me
that opportunity to do it. So again, Howard
, Sullivan walter dick bob morgan bob. Can you
were among the main people, mentors and helped me
in my career. And today a lot of people
still work like Morsi Tarasco have also been very instrumental
in the film. Yes. Who are some of
those people like Marcy that you've collaborated with? Sure
. Well, uh worked with Morsi several research studies
together. She's written a chapter from my book at
florida state. I've worked with what wager and john
Keller, bob Branson, roger kaufman, all those
people, we've worked together designing courses, doing some
research together. And then I have loads of colleagues
from other universities, Kent gustafson who used to be
at the University of Georgia. My can if it
was a student along well, Mike actually studied Arizona's
a few years after me, but Mike's another one
. Steve ross used to be the editor of E
T R and D. I could go on Dave
Merrill Donnie lee jim Morris. So I could go
on naming 15 or 20 people who have worked with
over the years. A lot of them recently with
the various editions of my text reader. Richie,
you just interviewed a few a few minutes ago,
so I'll stop right there, but I can name
many more. It's been a wonderful career and you
know, it's amazing after you've been in the field
of one period, get to know almost everybody in
the field and it's just a pleasure to see them
each year interact with them and in my case,
actually have them work with me as they write chapters
from my book. That's right. And what do
you think is the greatest accomplishment of your career?
And one, okay, I want to mention two
things. one is when I want the University Distinguished
Teaching Award Every year at Florida State, they give
out one award for the person who offered his or
her career has done an outstanding job of teaching and
I was the first one from the College of Education
ever to win that it wouldn't. And that to
me was like one of my ultimate accomplishment because I've
always felt I'm really devoted to my teaching, I
really work hard and to get that award to recognize
my accomplishment of areas was something I was extremely proud
of. The second thing is the trends and issues
. Little did I know that when I first did
that book, that it would have the impact that
it's had. Um we've done several studies that have
shown this book to be among the most frequently used
books in the most recent study along with wool ticks
can carry book, the most frequently required book and
programs in our field. So I'm really proud of
the fact that I put this book together. I
have to thank all the authors of the chapters because
I've only written a few chapters in the book has
have checked, but we get lots of others to
write chapters. It's because of the work of those
authors and my checks, putting it all together.
That that book has been as successful as it has
. And I to the state people come up to
me oh, dr research. I really liked that
book. So I'm really proud of that as well
. Um and how would you like to be remembered
? Wow, that's interesting. Well, first of
all, I hope I remember it as a good
person. Somebody who people enjoyed interacting with, who
was a caring, hardworking individual who helped move his
program, his department, his college and this profession
forward. And if I'm remembered in those regards will
be very happy. Well, thank you. Sure
about this has been great. It has an excellent