Identifying Important Criteria for Multimedia Instructional

SOFTWARE SELECTION DECISIONS, especially when they involve sophisticated multimedia instructional courseware can be difficult for educators. Many confounding factors such as teachers' inexperience with using instructional courseware and the emerging capability and sophistication of technology often make the evaluation and subsequent selection of courseware a challenging process. In 1999, a study was conducted in which a panel of instructional technology experts rated the importance of 110 criteria statements to multimedia instructional courseware evaluation. The criteria could serve as a basis for constructing evaluative instruments useful for software screening. Participants completed an on-line World Wide Web (WWW) survey on three separate occasions or rounds over a two-month period. All communication between participants and the researchers was asynchronous through the Internet. This paper describes the methods and materials used in the study. It discusses the criteria judged to be most important by the panel of experts and presents an analysis of their commentary, which was used