Designing Interesting Learning Environments When the Medium isn't enough

Abstract

Educators broadly agree that interest plays an important role in learning. In our work, we develop learning environments that align learner interest and important adult-defined learning objectives. Through this work we have come to recognise the complexity of the enterprise of this kind of learning environment design.¹ At this stage, we have a relatively stable design model in the passion curriculum design approach.² Missing, however, is a basis for analysing the interests and engagement of individual learners as they interact with a learning environment over time. This paper describes the theoretical and design frameworks we use, and recounts our most recent curriculum implementation, Multimedia Studio, and how it exposed this critical gap in the design model. We found that designing for learner interest is an even more complex undertaking than we originally understood. The lessons learned demonstrate the challenges of interest-centred approaches to curriculum design and can inform the work of other learning environment designers and researchers working in similar contexts.