The Educational Engineering Called Programmed Instruction

Much of the controversy over programmed learning has its genesis in a misunderstanding of the behavioral principles at its base and an identification of the external features of early programs with the full range of possibilities. This paper briefly describes the principles of programmed instruction and discusses recent evaluations of some earlier studies of programming variables. This discussion leads to a consideration of the relative importance of certain variables, like error-rate and relevance of stimulus to response. Finally, a procedure is outlined for the systematic generation of programmed material.