Teachers as planners: new t asks for the university professor

Abstract

This article derives from an investigation based on the design-based research model. The students’ learning planning is approached as an important characteristic of the decisions and activities of the professors. The chosen model allows for studying learning, in context considering the systematic planning, the instructional strategies and tools that are developed on innovative environments. This being an investigation within, on and about the instructional design, it involves the insertion on the processes through which the professors think about the teaching that they intend to perform. Professors from different universities from Spain and Chile have taken part in the intended sample, preferably those who bear a consolidated career as faculty and have evident innovative capacities. Learning sequences that are habitually planned and implemented by the professors have been investigated, bringing about a debate upon a process that is usually private: the context of the activities (objectives, expected results, prerequisites, content, environment, time and difficulty); the activities performed by the students (type, technique, interaction, roles, resources and evaluation); the way that the professors comprehend how to teach and learn. The resulting matrix shows learning sequences that can become didactical and training resources for both novice and experienced faculty, helping them find stimulus for developing the professors’ imagination.