Model-centered instruction

Model-centered instruction in an instructional theory developed by Dr. Andrew S. Gibbons. MCI focuses the instructional designer on direct experience, rather than content.

The basic premise of MCI is that the most effective learning and instruction takes place through experiences. The instructional designer helps facilitate the learning process by carefully selecting and sequencing problems. These problems give experience that in turn, help the learner build their own model.

The goal of MCI is to “support the establishment within the learner of internalized knowledge models”, and that goal is accomplished by “instructing from the basis of externalized models of three kinds: environment, system, and expert behavior”. (1)

(1) Gibbons, A. S., Model-Centered Instruction. Journal of Structural Learning and Intelligent Systems. 14: 511-540, 2001.