Chapter 4 stresses the importance of individuality in the development of technologies that teach and interact with people. The overall work is important as it stresses the fact that technologies, as a creation of man must be developed and manipulated to reflect the humanity of their purpose. The fallibility of the mind is stressed as is its limitations and the possibility of the development of greater tools to impart knowledge is the most important factor in the development of learning tools. Norman, D. (1988). The Design of Everyday Things. New York: Doubleday/Currency. [chapters 1, 2, 3, 4]

In this work Norman describes how important the built environment is to human understanding by describing why some things are embraced and others are rejected based on the confines of their make-up. Chapter 1 stresses the importance of creating everyday objects, and even more complex objects that are easy for the human mind to understand and therefore use. Chapter 2 stresses that regardless of the fact that the individual is more likely to blame him or herself for failure to be able to work a particular object or item the reality is that the fault often lies in some design flaw that led the user astray and created a missing link in their ability to use an item or object, and that this can apply to simple or even complex items. Chapter 3 stresses that knowledge of everyday objects often has to be stored in the mind to allow the user the ability to use it, stressing that base knowledge is necessary unless the built environment offers clues and directions for use. Chapter 4 stresses that the number of possible functions and/or options of utilizing an object or item guide the user through the progress of using it, and that experience and discovery are usually the best ways to master tasks.

Saffer, D. (2007) Designing for Interaction. Berkeley: New Riders.

Designing for Interaction describes a new frontier in the manner in which the built environment is designed. The work in Chapters 1-5 stresses the nature of the interactive and demonstrative way that usable objects are designed. Some of the items that Saffer uses to describe this new style of design principles are the iPod, and popular websites that are innovative in their ability to engage the user (Flicer for example) the book is written from a designers point-of-view, but is approachable for the lay user, and can seriously help an instructional educational designer to see the ways in which they and the learner can contribute to the development of new educational tools. Though the work does not specifically describe educational tools it does, from a design perspective describe innovative ways that the user can impact the process and interact with a built or virtual environment to develop better products and services that more effectively meet the needs of the user and the purpose of the materials. Hopefully this will be the first of many design centered works that are approachable enough to guide the developer through the process of research and development in a user friendly manner.

Schnotz, W., & Bannert, M. (2003). Construction and interference in learning from multiple representation. Learning and Instruction, 13, 141-156.

Schnotz and Bannert stated goal is to describe, "an integrated view of learning from verbal and pictorial representations. Learning from these representations is considered as a task oriented process of constructing multiple mental representations. Construction of these representations includes information selection and information organisation, parsing of symbol structures, mapping of analog structures as well as model construction and model inspection." (p.141) the purpose of the article is to help a designer of instructional or other material create a system where all the integrated functions of verbal and pictorial representations are applied, through systematic development and include all the aspects the learner will need to understand the construct of the information given. The article is particularly helpful in understanding the viewer/learner role in interpretation and evaluation, i.e. The active role of the learner in materials. Understanding the role the learner plays in development and use of instructional material and especially multi-media material is crucial to the development of instructional material that engages the learner and guides him or her through the process of learning the given information. Multi-media is an aspect of instructional design that is even more dependant upon the learner, and therefore needs to be developed...

(2004). The cognitive benefit of interactive videos: Learning to tie nautical knots. Learning and Instruction, 14, 293-305.
Schwann and Riempp developed a research design that attempted to discover the user acceptance of an interactive program that helped them learn how to tie four nautical knots. The program success or failure was then determined by the ability of the individual to interact with the program and effectively learn the material through it. The stress of the experiment was that interactive tools must be designed in such a way that they do not stress cognitive lead, i.e. demand more from the user than they are able to give, by way of over stimulation or other means that detract from the purpose of the learning materials. The key, within this work to the development of an appropriate set of materials was interaction, as the work compared interactive videos, to non-interactive videos, that taught the same task and those who utilized the interactive multi-media materials where more successful in a shorter amount of time that those who utilized demonstrative videos for the same learning materials. This work says a lot about the nature and need for interaction in the learning environment, even among adults. It seems that the sense of control offered the learner as well as their ability to stop and start instructional material, through interaction made a big different e in how well and how rapidly they conquered the tasks, in comparison to those who simply viewed the materials at the pace of the instructor.

Sharp, H. (2007). Interaction Design: Beyond Human-Computer Interaction. Hoboken: Wiley. [chapter 5].

Sharp's article develops a significant message about the nature of affect in the development of computer human interaction. The work describes ways in which the interactive environment can display affect, as a set of supporting cues for the user, as well as how this effects the affect of the user, and therefore the core emotions that can guide learning and positivism of any given experience. The idea of the importance of positivism, ties in to the idea that emotions can be the gatekeepers for information learning and its application to computer interactions help guide the educational designer in the manner in which emotions are best elicited by the interactive design of the instructional material. The work uses examples such as interactive emoticons to describe the way in which affect tools can be added to materials to help guide and encourage the individual in the multi-media learning environment and how negative or frustrating interfaces or emoticons can either guide the user back into the material or create negativity and therefore resistance to it. Sharp pays particular attention as to how to design and utilize an effective error message, rather than one that leaves the learner feeling rejected and frustrated by the program.

Shedroff (1999). Information Interaction Design: A Unified Field Theory of Design. In Jacobsen, R. (Ed.), Information Design, pp. 267-292. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

Shedroff, stresses the importance of the creation of valuable, compelling and empowering information and experiences for others by stressing that the systems to do so, no matter the media can be translated to those skills we already possess. In other words the author contends that we already understand the systems that are available to create effective communication of material, and we just need to apply them to new mediums to effectively create instructional material. Shedroff states that, "the methods of solving problems, responding to audiences, and communicating to others in any medium are enough alike for us to consider then identical for the purpose of this paper." (p.267) Shedroff then goes on to describe the basic materials associated with the conveyance of information and the various ways they have been effectively organized in the past to create understanding, and then goes on to discuss the manner which these old forms of organization can be applied to new media to elicit understanding from a learner or a participant. The message makes clear that old applications of learning are clearly pertinent to even the most specialized instructional design and should be utilized in much the same way as they have been in the past to generate knowledge and understanding on the part of the learner.

Shneiderman, B., & Plaisant, C. (2005). Designing the User…