Teaching Engineers To Study

The basic structure of human activities is knowing and acting. The knowing and acting were fused at the beginning of human activities. When activities went in depth and understanding about active objects became rich and profound, and human's knowledge about the active objects became systematic, theories were formed. The theory could develop according to the logic of its own as soon as it was formed, and some people began specially to do theoretical research. Then knowing and acting were separated gradually.Teaching has the same structure as human's common activities, and it is also composed of knowing and acting which can be summed up in two basic teaching questions:what is teaching and how to teach. The first one is about knowing which is theoretical and the second is about acting which is practical. Instructional theories and practice developed from fusing in nature to separating in reality with its development. Originally instructional theory researchers and teaching practitioners had same objectives and later they divided into two groups between whom there is much attack and little effective dialogue, which has restricted their development because neither of them can get what they want from the other.The thesis holds that there is a gap between instructional theories and practice, and also between instructional theory researchers and practitioners. As recognizing medium and as intermediary, instructional thinking and instructional engineers can fill the gap. Instructional engineers can make the relation between instructional theories and practice harmonious, make the structure of teaching workers complete, improve the primary and secondary school teachers' teaching ability, and deepen the teaching reform. The thesis made a preliminary systematic research into instructional engineers.Instructional engineers are instructional workers who put instructional theories into practice, design the train of instructional thought and teaching plans, and provide answers to the question how to teach. They understand instructional theories deeply and know teaching practice very well. Compared with instructional theories, the thought train and teaching plans they designed are more practical, and compared with teachers'teaching plans, they are more theoretical. They lie between instructional theories and practice. Instructional engineers are the intermediate subject connecting instructional theories and practice, instructional theory researchers and teaching practitioners. In reality, some instructional theory researchers, primary and secondary school teachers, teaching and research staffs and subject instruction theory teachers are possible instructional engineers among whom the teaching and research staffs and the subject instruction theory teachers are the main force. Masters and doctors of education, "4+2" pedagogic masters and masters of the theory of curriculum and instruction are the potential instructional engineers.The thesis demonstrates the necessity and probability of instructional engineers by theoretical analysis and investigation. It explores the instructional engineers'working mechanism according to which it explores the instructional engineers'duties and working methods. Instructional engineers are the teaching workers who have instructional thinking. Instructional thinking is a unity of instructional views and the thought train of teaching practice guided by the teaching views. In a word, it is a unity of "knowing" and "acting". Instructional engineers connect the instructional theories with the teaching practice through developing and constructing instructional thinking. First, they interpret teaching theories and reveal the instructional views in the theories and expound the instructional views. Second, they plan and design the instructional thinking. Third, they propose the operational suggestions and quality requirements for teaching practitioners. The process of carrying out the duties above is the one which instructional theories and teaching practice combine through instructional thinking. Instructional engineers carry out the duties by explaining, planning, designing and constructing thinking models.The thesis constructs the instructional engineers' quality model through exploratory factor analysis using investigation. The instructional engineers' quality structure consists of three dimensions such as attitude, knowledge and ideas, and ability. Attitude dimension includes the aspiration to develop and transform instructional theories and the desire to explore teaching practice. Knowledge and idea dimension includes subject knowledge, teaching practice knowledge and general knowledge, understanding the teaching spirit and establishing a correct teaching view. Ability dimension includes capabilities of explaining, planning and designing teaching, expressing, communicating and leading, and reflecting. Additionally, instructional engineers need to have engineering thinking. Their thinking is idealistic and virtual, transformative and constructive, diverse and cooperative, unique and advanced, and practical and innovative. To sum up, as instructional engineers, their knowing and acting are unified, their emotion and thinking are simultaneous and their wisdom and abilities are collaborative.The thesis investigates the current situation of instructional engineers' quality using quality structure questionnaire for instructional engineers. The result of the investigation displays that the instructional engineers have strong desire and positive attitudes to develop the applied research of instructional theories, excellent knowledge basis of subject and instructional theories, but their subject realm, instructional realm and understanding of the instructional spirit are not good enough. They can't interpret instructional theories and practice deeply, can't plan and design the teaching well, which affects the development of their abilities of explaining, communicating, leading and reflecting.The thesis analyses the training programs using literature analysis method in order to comprehend the present cultivation situation of instructional engineers. It is found out that the objectives are not clear in training senior applied research talents. Few training programs investigated have such curricula as teaching philosophy, bridging mingled curricula of instructional theories and practice and curricula of engineering training, subject history, subject method and subject ideology, which enriches students' instructional theory and subject knowledge, but cannot help them get enough instructional or subject realm and accomplishment, engineering awareness, engineering thinking or engineering accomplishment.The thesis puts forward the training principles and training ways according to the instructional engineers' duties and their present quality and training situation. It should be put forward clearly to cultivate the "senior applied research talents" or "instructional engineers" in the cultivating objectives during the high education. There should be such curricula as teaching philosophy, designing, and subject development history and so on. Instructional theory learning and practice training should be linked up seamlessly. Lectures should be profound, fine and systematic. Superficial discussions should be avoided. Case studies should pay attention to the synthesis of knowing and acting. Teachers should overstep their professional limitations and pursue the integration of instructional theories and practice. Academic exchange should be based on attentive reading and practice exploring in order to avoid mere formalities. Enough attention should be paid to in job training stage such as carrying out regular education, establishing united teaching and research organizations, arranging university teachers to work in primary and secondary schools, restructuring teaching and research organizations and optimizing the training content.