Helping Students Become Skilled Practitioners

Becoming a skilled practitioner means learning both conceptual and process knowledge. We propose the use of hypermedia to provide components of an apprenticeship learning model for students, in which process and conceptual knowledge learning is integrated. Our model for this use of hypermedia is called an Apprenticeship Based Learning Environment (ABLE). We present seven design principles for an ABLE based on learning research, and show how these are met in our first ABLE, STABLE. The formative evaluation of STABLE suggests that it supports learning and performance, but leaves the students unsatisfied. We suggest an eight principle for iterative design of ABLE tools that meets students’ needs. Helping Students Become Skilled Practitioners Becoming a skilled practitioner involves gaining deep conceptual knowledge as well as process knowledge in order to solve problems. Conceptual knowledge is the information that one most often thinks about as propositions about a field: Definitions, patterns, facts about relationships (e.g., “F=ma”). Process knowledge is the information about how one goes about activities: Heuristics for how to decide the next step, how to use the tools and techniques of a domain, approaches that work well with given kinds of problems. Skilled practitioners have an ability to undertake a complex process in the domain of their expertise and to change their process to suit a given problem in the domain (Schon, 1982). Doctors,