Instructional Technology & Instructional Design

Ph.D. Candidate (Instructional Technology)

I entered SIUC in Fall 2005 and have been working with video game modding using Neverwinter Nights Game Development Toolkit to look for ways to use video games for various educational purposes.

My major research interests include the affordances of video games for education, measurement using video games and database, and aesthetic experiences in educational technology. After receiving my Ph.D. degree, I plan to teach at a higher institution and contribute to this field as a great researcher in US or Canada.

M.S. (Instructional Design)

Prior to pursuing his M.S. in Instructional Design (ID), David was passionate about teaching science in a middle school setting. In his first year of teaching, he conducted research within his classroom exploring the effects of altering his students learning environment to be one that reflects the true nature of exploratory inquiry for science. Although, his love for students and science was not able to overcome the constraints placed on the teaching profession. He then realized that his excitement for developing instructional units could be better suited and valued in an adult learning/corporate setting.

David is proficient in a wide variety of author-ware for presentations, facilitating discussions, and sharing knowledge effectively for “design” purposes. He is currently rounding out additional skills in his last semester at SIUC by familiarizing himself with more of the Adobe Suite and CMS/LMS to insure his success working on future team of designers and IT professionals. A complete list of these design/technical software can be found on his resume.

Ph.D. Program (Instructional Technology)

Throughout my academic and professional experiences, I have become increasingly aware of the important link between administration, curriculum development and instruction. At the University of Technology, Jamaica, I majored in Administrative Management. While working as an administrative support to both the Dean and the Director of Graduate Studies and Research in the Faculty of Education and Liberal Studies (FELS), I received a good foundation on the role of curriculum and instruction. I also enjoyed giving insights to the university students about their respective program requirements. I developed a love for teaching while serving as a lecturer for the course Organizational Behavior at the Jamaica Institute of Management. Consequently, I decided to pursue a career in the field of education. My work experience at the University of Technology, Jamaica as an administrative assistant to both the Dean and Director of graduate studies in the Faculty of Education and Liberal Studies complements my undergraduate preparation in Administrative Management and gives me a management perspective of education and training.

Currently, I am a doctoral student in the Department of Curriculum and Instruction with an emphasis in Instructional Technology. The courses that I completed have prepared me well in the analysis, design, development, implementation and evaluation of instructional programs.

Please see the resume link that provides further details of the projects that I completed in each area.

Regina Kaplan-Rakowski

Ph.D. Program (Instructional Technology)

Regina’s strong background in foreign languages allows her to combine expertise in applied linguistics with the research opportunities that are available using modern instructional technology.  Her primary focus is research on teaching languages in online environments, especially through virtual worlds and digital games.

Regina comes from Poland where she received her B.Ed. in Teaching English as Second Language (TESL) and M.Ed. in European Studies.  Those degrees allowed her to pursue a career as an ESL teacher and a freelance translator/interpreter.  She furthered her studies in the USA, where she obtained an M.A. in Foreign Languages and Literatures from SIUC.  Throughout her career, Regina gained experience as a teacher of French, Spanish, Polish and English.  Furthermore, Regina is constantly broadening her language background with studies in Mandarin Chinese, Portuguese, German, Italian, Russian, Arabic and Korean.  Thanks to these language studies Regina has accumulated a detailed research interest in second language acquisition, especially in bilingualism/multilingualism, code-switching, and the application of mnemonics in language acquisition and instruction.

In the future, Regina is hoping to continue research that combines foreign languages and instructional technology as well as in the field of second language acquisition.

Tonya Shride

Ph.D. Program (Instructional Technology)

I am a doctoral student at Southern Illinois University and am currently specializing in Instructional Technology. I work as a teaching and research assistant at the university where I am delighted to teach classroom management. Generally, people retire to do what they love doing, I retired from teaching high school and college classes to continue advanced studies and help tomorrow’s teacher be well prepared for a challenging career field.

I hold a B.S. in English Education, M.S. in Secondary Education and am a Fellow of the National Endowment for the Humanities in Shakespearean studies. I have studied at Southern Illinois University, Eastern Washington University, Westminster College, the Shakespeare Center in Stratford-Upon-Avon, John A. Logan College, and the University of Delaware.

Ph.D. Program (Instructional Technology)

Bilal is one of the first Palestinian students in our program.