What is control?

One of the main challenges for an author is to find a (new) balance between sufficient freedom for learners to regulate their own learning process and guidance of the learning process. The basic scenario in discovery learning with simulations is the learner who is freely interacting with the simulation, setting up his or her own plan. Since this quite often is not a very fruitful way of learning, in SimQuest we have introduced instructional support measures (e.g., assignments). Still we can design a very open environment by making this instructional support available for the learner and let learners decide themselves if and when they want to use the support. SimQuest, however, also provides the author the opportunity to insert control, which means that the author can specify when specific parts of support become available, and even that the learner is obliged to use a specific support measure (e.g., to make a specific assignment). Essentially this is the well known distinction between learner control and system control. In learner control the learner decides the next step and in system control the system decides this.