Supporting the instructional design process for team training

Conducting team training is daily business for the military. Designing team training programs and exercises, however, is not always that structured. Instructional designers are in fact trained to design instruction primarily for individuals. After their instructional design course, they learn to design team training more or less on the job. This process may be improved by offering these instructional designers adequate support. During three design-experiments, we developed and tested guidelines and a workshop supporting the analysis of team tasks and the design of team training scenarios. For the first (task analysis) and second (scenario design) experiment, two versions of guidelines were developed: an experimental version with an explicit focus on team aspects, and a control version in which this specific focus was absent, resembling traditional guidelines. The results of the first design-experiment show that the experimental guidelines lead to a significantly better quality of the analysis process; the results of the second design-experiment show no significant effects. The purpose of the third design-experiment was to investigate the effect of a more elaborate introduction (an interactive workshop) of both sets of experimental guidelines. The results show that only on topics that were explicitly dealt with, the analysis and design process improved.