Designing for Anticipation

This article provides a brief review of the concept of anticipation as it relates to learning and learning design—an ongoing mental process demonstrated to be central among mental processes and closely related to memory, action, and learning. Two recommendations are provided for: (a) increased exploration and use of the concept of anticipation within the Educational Technology field, and (b) the re-examination and possible restructuring of current concepts of instructional strategy in view of the possible implementation of anticipation mechanisms. A rationale is provided for placing emphasis on the study of anticipatory processes as they might be acted upon by learning experience design, to provide a conceptual basis for strategizing the use of rapidly emerging intelligent agent technologies. The chapter concludes with a moral tale showing the consequences of neglecting to do so.