The Teaching Competency

“Good teaching is instructional design. Your lesson planning, ability to meet standards, and passion are directly responsible for your success in teaching. It’s no different as an instructional designer, except now it’s learning objectives, design, and development.”

– Alex Phung, former middle-school math teacher turned instructional designer

The first, and perhaps the most important, element of The Four Competencies Model is your ability to think like an educator. By understanding how to analyze and structure content as an educator does, you'll be able to help people learn better from the courses you design.

Figure 2.1 – The Teaching Competency

In this chapter, you will learn about:

• The similarities between teaching, curriculum design, and instructional design
• How knowing learning theories, structuring content, and learning objectives will help you as an ID
• The ADDIE model of instructional design, specifically the analysis phase which correlates most closely to teaching and training
• The importance of the analysis phase and knowing your target audience
• How to build your teaching competency skills as an ID