Instructional Design serves a specific purpose: to bring about a change or accomplish a result (Brown & Green, 2020). Its purpose may be to educate, to correct an issue, to raise awareness, or a variety of other tasks. There is always some type of knowledge or skill to impart to the learners.

Needs Analysis can help instructional designers (IDs) to gain a deeper understanding of the needs, challenges, and objectives they are attempting to address (Brown & Green, 2020). A Needs Analysis will include information about the Problem, the Audience, and the proposed Solution.

Some of the major items addressed by a Needs Analysis can include:

• What needs to be accomplished?
• Who is requesting this?
• Who is the audience?
• What are the goals and learning objectives?
• How will the results be evaluated?

Learner Analysis is another important step in the Instructional Design process (Brown & Green, 2020). Depending on the number of learners and other factors, the Learner Analysis may be very simple, or it can be an in-depth look at the types of learners which will constitute the audience.

Learner Analysis can aid the ID in understanding what the target audience is capable of as well as what they already know (Brown & Green, 2020). The Learner Analysis will include evaluation of the learners’ Skills, Prior Knowledge, and Motivation. Combined with a Needs Analysis, the Learner Analysis can provide a clearer picture of how to achieve the instructional goals.

Some major questions for Learner Analysis include:

• Are the learners a captive audience or volunteers?
• Are there any spoken or written language barriers?
• What is the age range or maturity level of the learners?
• What prior knowlege of the subject do the learners possess?
• If the task is manual, do the learners have the manual dexterity or physical capacity to perform this task?
• Any other roadbloacks to mastery of this task?