Setting Educational Objectives

In 1956, Benjamin Bloom, an America educational psychologist, set a classification of learning objectives, called a taxonomy. In it, he set the standard for learning objectives which build upon each other, making the learning process more efficient and more effective through this holistic approach. He classified these educational objectives into three “domains:” Affective (attitude), Psychomotor (skills), and Cognitive (knowledge).

The Affective Domain describes the way people react emotionally. There are five levels which move from the lowest to highest. They are:

1. Receiving: the student passively pays attention. Without this level no learning can occur.
2. Responding: the student actively participates in the learning process.
3. Valuing: the student attaches a value to something.
4. Organizing: the student can put together different values, information, and ideas by comparing, relating and elaborating on the information learned.
5. Characterizing: the student holds a particular value or belief that now exerts influence on his behavior.

The Psychomotor Domain describe the ability to physically manipulate a tool or instrument. These objectives tend to focus on change of behavior and/or skills. Bloom never created subcategories for skills in the psychomotor domain, although others did so later.

The Cognitive Domain revolves around knowledge, comprehension, and critical thinking. There are six levels in this taxonomy, moving from lowest to highest, with each one building upon the previous.  They are:

1. Knowledge: can exhibit memory of previously learned materials by recalling basic facts, terms, concepts and answers.
2. Comprehension: demonstrates understanding of facts and ideas by organizing, comparing, translating, interpreting, giving descriptions, and stating main ideas.
3. Application: using new found knowledge. Solve problems by applying knowledge, facts, techniques and rules.
4. Analysis: examine and break information into parts or categories by identifying motives or causes. Can make inferences and locate evidence to support generalizations.
5. Synthesis: compile information together to create something new or develop an original idea about something.
6. Evaluation: The critical thinking stage.  Present and defend opinions by making judgments about information, validity of ideas or quality of work based on a set of criteria.

So, how can this information help you in your homeschooling efforts to prepare your child for college?  Simple.  Most people intuitively know these steps are taken in the learning process, but haven’t thought through all of them and how they pertain to each other.  Knowing this, it can help you to better prepare your student by understanding the steps that need to be taken so that he can more efficiently and effectively learn the necessary information that will prepare him for college and life.  Any thoughts?  Are you already using a similar process?

Note:  Some information was taken from Wikipedia.

Related posts:

1. Goal Setting
2. Educational Thought for the Day