Skill Decomposition

In instructional design, skill decomposition is the activity of first identifying the end goal of a learning event in terms of what the learner should see and be able to do as the result of the learning events and activities, and next, breaking down the component skills into smaller and smaller increments of skill and attendant knowledge. The latter decomposition effort continues until the skills are at such a rudimentary level that it would be a pragmatically wasted effort to continue further. Engagement in skill decomposition typically begins with a needs assessment or analysis, during which time performance challenges are identified and the gap between current and desired results due specifically to insufficient skill is identified.

Once the target skills-focused objective(s) is or are identified, the work of decomposing, or breaking down, the skill ensues. This analysis activity and breakdown of a skill typically occur in a flowcharted format. Flowcharting software is used to build out visual representations of decomposed skills. Prioritizing skill decomposition as a [Page 652]central instructional design activity is key to achieving effective skills-based learning as the result. Lack of precision in this vital task will result in no clearly defined and sequenced learning objectives, no order to the learning process, no ability to assess learning, and no effective impact on the organization. In this entry, the basics of skill decomposition are discussed, followed by a discussion of principled skill decomposition based on Jeroen van Merriënboer’s 4C/ID (four component instructional design) model. A brief case-based example of skill decomposition is provided to highlight the basic process of skill decomposition.

Skill Decomposition Basic Terminology

As is the case in goal theory, one cannot move in the direction of breaking down a skill into its component parts in order to build a model of the learning design if the desired end result is left undefined. Skill decomposition begins with the identification of the end learning result, which is in the form of a behavior or skill that can be demonstrated. This end result is also called the target objective. Once defined, skills are broken down into their constituent human capabilities so that they can then be organized in a way that builds that end, or target objective. There are a number of human capabilities that can be combined in various ways to achieve desired learning outcomes. Such human capabilities include verbal knowledge, attitudes, motor skills, cognitive strategies, and a hierarchical building-block group of intellectual skills. Intellectual skills can be further categorized in terms of discrimination, concrete concepts, defined concepts, rules, and problem solving (in order of increasing complexity). The ability to decompose skills resides in a deep understanding of the meaning of each of these capabilities and the ability to break down each task—no matter how complex—into a hierarchically developed flowchart portraying human capability linkages, concurrencies, decision steps, and sequences. These human capabilities, each with their capability verb used in developing learning objectives, are provided in Figure 1.

Figure 1 Human capabilities and associated verbs

Building Block Results

To decompose a skill, one must ask what the various human capabilities are that, when combined, will instill the target skill. As those capabilities are identified at a first lower level as enabling objectives, they must be configured appropriately according to what must be learned first, second, and so on, with each prerequisite skill being sequenced further and further to the left and down when flowcharted. Once this second level of human capabilities is flowcharted and aligned to the target objective, this level of enabling objectives then becomes a list of target objectives and the process repeats. Depending on the complexity of the skill to be demonstrated at the end of the instruction, this process can be repeated a number of times, and the flowcharting can be quite complex.

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