Teaching Through Self-instruction, Derek Rowntree, London: Kogan Page, 1986

This text, for educators who need "practical advice on teaching with self-instruction" (p. 13), is a smorgasbord of suggestions, examples, and ideas. In fifteen chapters and 386 pages, it touches on everything from managing a course team to applying the Fog Index. Comparable publications are a British Open University course, How to develop self-instructional teaching (D. Rowntree & B. Connors (Eds.) (1979) Milton Keynes: The Open University) and Course development: A manual for editors of distance-teaching materials (J. Jenkins (1985) London: International Extension College/Commonwealth Secretariat).

The book begins with a brief introduction and ends with a chapter offering advice and encouragement for the reader who is now well-instructed and ready to start a course writing project. Chapters 2 to 4 focus on planning of development procedures, course content, and instructional design. Chapter 5 illustrates a variety of possible features in print materials, using examples from Open University courses. Chapters 6 to 8 deal with structure, describing how to organize a lesson, build in activities, provide variety, and make the structure clear to the learner. Chapters 9 to 12 offer hints on presentation - writing style, physical format, and the use of various media. Chapters on student assessment and course evaluation complete the series.

Advising and assisting course writers is a problem for every distance teaching program. With this text, Rowntree assumes, probably correctly, that a substantial number of people who prepare courses are busy, inexperienced in this type of instruction, and anxious to do the job with as little fuss as possible. He also assumes that they will be willing to spend a couple of evenings browsing in his book and keep it by them as a handy reference as they work.

This book may appeal to you if: (A) You are looking for a guide that is easy to read. The author has taken to heart his advice about writing clearly and simply. (B) Your course will consist primarily of free- standing print materials. Other media receive little attention. (C) You have access only to simple technology such as a typewriter or basic graphics materials. The author demonstrates the versatility of the typewriter (the book itself is reproduced typed copy) and shows easy ways of low-cost illustration.

This book will not appeal to you if: (A) You look for an underlying philosophy of instructional design. The author claims programmed learning as his instructional starting point, but this guide is common sense delivered by a wise uncle. (B) You need a critical analysis that identifies sources of instructional design principles and can help you make a judgement about what works best when and for whom. There are only a few such references embedded in the text and these are incomplete. (C) You become impatient with people who suggest that anything more than print materials, and perhaps audiocassettes, should be considered out of reach economically and not worth the bother anyway.