Overview
Developing high-quality learning objectives is necessary for an effective teaching session. Learning objectives guide the teaching and learning processes, provide learners with an understanding of expectations and facilitate appropriate assessment activities.
Goals and Objectives
Learning objectives can be differentiated from learning goals:
- Learning goals are larger aims of your instruction. For example: a learning goal for your session might be that students become more comfortable managing acute pain.
- Learning objectives articulate the necessary tasks that must be accomplished to achieve the learning goals. For example: a learning objective applied to achieving the previously stated goal could be to, “Calculate dose conversions among intravenous formulations of morphine, hydromorphone and fentanyl when presented with a case of a patient with acute pain.”
Learning goals and objectives should emphasize only the most high-yield content and should guide all instructional activities. For example: to achieve an objective that students demonstrate an ability to conduct a code status discussion, students must be provided the opportunity to practice or role play this skill.
“If you don’t know where you are going, you might not get there.” - Yogi Berra
Key Learning Points
Learning objectives:
- Provide the instructional roadmap toward achieving learning goals.
- Should emphasize the highest priority content and sessions should be structured around achieving these objectives.
- Should be specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, time-bound (SMART), and should articulate the audience, desired behavior, conditions under which behavior is expected and the degree of competency expected.
Guiding Principles
When developing learning objectives, consider the following questions:
- Who is the target audience and what is known about their previous knowledge?
- How much time do I have to help students achieve these objectives?
- What are the expectations of students in this venue?
- What level of mastery do I want students to achieve?
- How will students demonstrate mastery and what is an acceptable level of performance?
SMART Learning Objectives
Learning objectives should be specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, time-bound (SMART). They should also include the following components:
- Audience (e.g. students)
- Behavior (e.g. identify, demonstrate)
- Condition (under what circumstances)
- Degree (level of competency expected)
Taxonomies of the Cognitive Domain
Bloom’s Taxonomy of the Cognitive Domain can assist in developing learning objectives targeted toward an attainable level of mastery. The following table provides some example action verbs to help you describe what learners will be doing as a result of your instruction.
| Cognitive Level | Behavior | Action Verbs |
|---|---|---|
| Remembering | Recalling from memory | identify, list, recall, define, repeat, recognize, name, quote, reproduce, recite |
| Understanding | Constructing meaning from material | explain, discuss, describe, infer, interpret, conclude, restate, translate, express |
| Applying | Performing or using learned material to conduct a procedure | apply, employ, demonstrate, show, practice, exhibit, use, complete, produce |
| Analyzing | Determine relationships among concepts and materials | compare, contrast, differentiate, classify, connect, prioritize, correlate |
| Evaluating | Make judgments and critiques of material | judge, evaluate, assess, appraise, criticize, defend, rank, argue |
| Creating | Put material together to form a new, coherent whole | invent, develop, propose, construct, design, formulate |
Wrap Up
Write learning objectives. This helps you as an educator focus on what is most important for learners to master.
- Resist the temptation to bypass writing learning objectives.
- Keep learning objectives at the forefront of your teaching session.
- Align your instructional strategies with the verbs used in your objectives to facilitate appropriate assessment.
References
Anderson, L. W. and Krathwohl, D. R., et al (eds.) A Taxonomy for Learning, Teaching, and Assessing: A Revision of Bloom’s Taxonomy of Educational Objectives. Allyn & Bacon. Pearson Education Group, 2001.
Bloom, B.S. and Krathwohl, D. R. Taxonomy of Educational Objectives: The Classification of Educational Goals, by a committee of college and university examiners. Handbook I: Cognitive Domain. Longmans, Green, 1956.