Hypertext for training
======================

500 year-old       The basic formula for most classroom activities comes from
approach           Thomas Aquinas, who stood at the front and lectured
============       -- because Thomas was the only one in the room who had books.

                   And five centuries later, this model is still in use.
                   But, instead of 30 aspiring scholars acquiring knowledge
                   from rapt concentration, most teaching is closer to:
Ŀ
    Event                  Students listening         Students daydreaming  
       Recess bell             30                              0            
       Discussion              12                             18            
       Explanations             5                             25            
       Lecture                  3                             27            
       Question answered        1                             29            
       Business meeting         0                             30            

                   Why this diminished capacity to learn from others?  Unlike,
Why people are     their information-starved contemporaries of 500 years ago,
less teachable     today's students are over-fed and burdened by a the
==============     never-ending assault of information -- and with little
<link46 1 21>      training to separate the wheat from the chaff.

Limit the          People want you to "show me the answer and let me integrate it
information        myself."  Solutions are often more desired than knowledge.
===========        Hypertext, because of its expedience, very easily transfers
                   knowledge to people who are information over-loaded.

Basic concept      The fundamental principle in organizing hypertext systems
=============      is to make access to any desired information intuitively
                   obvious and obtainable within less than a dozen keystrokes.
<link04>           The relationships between information units must be very
                   clear so that the users naturally acquire the structure of
                   the system of information (which is knowledge).

Benefits           Advantages of this approach are:
========        Ŀ
                  -  desired (clean) information with the fat removed       
<link43 1 21>     -  hypertext that is easy and obvious to use              
                  -  users successful in solving information needs          
                  -  a system of knowledge acquired through use             
                  -  reduced need for and expenses of training              
                
Low interest       Typically, with classroom knowledge for college students:
in knowledge
============           5% are interested in the knowledge itself
                      20% are interested in the grade instead of the knowledge
<link48 2 8>          75% are interested in anything but the knowledge

                   These ratios are no different with most military and
                   industrial training programs.  So, what can hypertext do
                   to reduce training costs?

What to do?        Hypertext converts users who have passive attitudes toward
===========        information into active browsers of systems of knowledge.
                   In one sense, hypertext "menuizes" everything to
                   constantly prompt (or prod) users at every point into
                   making active choices that lead to information.

                   For that reason, regardless of initial attitudes toward
                   learning, hypertext formats entice users into acquiring
                   knowledge.  That makes hypertext a most effective
                   substitute for portions of most training.

 
==== <g HYPERTEXT>                  36 links in glossary topic
==== <g TRAINING>                    2 links in glossary topic
