Accelerating Instructor Mastery (AIM) Navy SBIR FY2015.2 Sol No.: Navy SBIR FY2015.2 Topic No.: N152-108 Topic Title: Accelerating Instructor Mastery (AIM) Proposal No.: N152-108-0624 Firm: Design Interactive, Inc. 3504 Lake Lynda Drive Ste. 400 Orlando, Florida 32817 Contact: Stephen Young Phone: (407) 706-0977 Abstract: Mission readiness is highly dependent upon the quality of instruction units receive; thus, it is critical that military instructors develop instructional competencies, along with domain expertise, to adequately promote relevant KSAs among trainees. Unlike civilian career educators, military instructors are not often afforded the time or resources to fully develop their teaching skills prior to instructional duties. Design Interactive, Inc. proposes a computer-based training tool to accelerate instructor development using methods such as video-modeling and guided instruction both in and out of the classroom. Phase I will demonstrate capabilities for the Interactive Military Instructor Training and Assessment TEchnology (IMITATE), a platform facilitating development of effective training material to advance military instructors from novice to master level. IMITATE will: (1) support delivery of multiple training methods for maximizing instructor learning within our Prepare, Practice, Assess framework, (2) provide features for organizing digital assets for creating an archive of lessons from reusable content, (3) function from a flexible architecture that affords rapid adaptation for quick transition to new contexts, and (4) include an easy to use interface to support operational test/evaluation, as well as ongoing research in evaluating the training methods and system deigns that most effectively expedite learning for novice instructors. Benefits: IMITATE will provide video-based, guided learning for military instructors within an easy to use computer-based instructional too. It will promote teaching and instructional competencies critical to promoting critical operational knowledge and skills among trainees and will appeal to organizations (e.g., The Basic School at Quantico) that need to rapidly develop the instructional skills of novice instructors. With an easy to use interface, instructors will be able to prepare for instruction via observation of master instructors, practice instruction by capturing video of themselves to be rated and rating peers, assess their progress and performance by reviewing ratings and feedback from expert instructors on their practice sessions as well as comparing their review of peers with the ratings and reviews of expert reviewers. Video based training, with integrated cognitive skills training methods such as prompting and guided learning, ensures military instructors fully understand the core competencies for instruction and are able to modify their behaviors to model those competencies. Leveraging existing concepts, tools, and recent data on key behaviors, knowledge, and competencies underlying Marine Corp Instructor Mastery, our proposed SBIR product becomes a highly beneficial tool with rapid return on investment. Integrated tools for capturing video, ratings, feedback, and organizing learning objects facilitates the development of a robust lesson repository that can be accessed by instructors for building key instructional competencies and refreshing those skills over time. IMITATE is directly applicable to military schoolhouses, but also applies to training for universities and/or corporate educational and coaching entities. Easy application and implementation of the approaches and technology within existing military instructor training programs, along with a flexible foundation that promotes quick customization to new domains and contexts, promotes commercial appeal and increases potential for transition to multiple new customers. Return