An introductory information systems course should ideally provide students with skills they will need for using, managing, and making decisions about a wide range of rapidly developing information technologies, including some that are not currently available but will emerge long after they complete the course. It is neither feasible nor practical for everyone to keep up with every aspect of all the new technologies. I designed this approach to provide students with the skills and motivation they need to keep up with new technologies after they complete the class. Figure 1 diagrams the traditional approach to IS education, while Figure 2 diagrams the Learning Needs Model. The instructor implements the Learning Needs Model through a series of homework assignments that offer practical, hands-on experiences which develop in an incremental and cumulative fashion.
Students do the first assignment as individuals, but subsequent assignments are team projects.
Each assignment includes printed outputs required from every student or team, and in-class oral presentations distributed so that every student makes one presentation during the semester. Therefore in relation to information technology, the learning needs and what is important for one student will be somewhat different than for other students. The following week, students receive a handout and a lecture presentation on characteristics that indicate that an information technology is or will become important. They then write up their topic according to a format that includes a definition and an explanation of the importance. The importance of this assignment is that it provides a strategy for evaluating what is important in this field, and practice in applying this strategy.