Sunday, November 7, 2010

Learning Design

Blooms Taxonomy

"Over fifty years ago, Benjamin Bloom developed his cognitive taxonomy that is still used widely in education today".(Bloom's Taxonomy in the Classroom: Differentiated Instruction Using Benjamin Bloom's Taxonomy http://www.suite101.com/content/blooms-taxonomy-in-the-classroom-a193162#ixzz14f0Vqla7)
 
Blooms Taxonomy is a framework that classifies knowledge from a low level (Knowledge, Understanding and Application) to higher level (Analysis, Evaluation and Synthesis). This framework identifies three domains of learning: Cognitive, Affective and Psycho-Motor. It provides a basic sequential model for dealing with topics in the curriculum and also suggests a way of categorising levels of learning.

v  Cognitive: the most-used of the domains, refers to knowledge structures (although sheer “knowing the facts” is its bottom level). It can be viewed as a sequence of progressive contextualisation of the material. (Based on Bloom, 1956)

v  Affective: the Affective domain has received less attention, and is less intuitive than the Cognitive. It is concerned with values, or more precisely perhaps with perception of value issues, and ranges from mere awareness (Receiving), through to being able to distinguish implicit values through analysis. (Kratwohl, Bloom and Masia (1964))
v  Psycho-Motor: Bloom never completed work on this domain, and there have been several attempts to complete it. One of the simplest versions has been suggested by Dave (1975): it fits with the model of developing skill put forward by Reynolds (1965), and it also draws attention to the fundamental role of imitation in skill acquisition.


This image was extracted from Google Images

Applying this framework to today's learners
Bloom’s taxonomy provides a guideline for creating assignments, discussion questions, and assessments that address the kinds of skills that students must develop to be critical thinkers and learners. The first and second steps of the taxonomy are often where teachers spend most of their time, but the last four steps are where critical thinking is developed.

References
Nickel, J. (2010 , January 23). Bloom's Taxonomy in the Classroom. Retrieved November 7, 2010, from Differentiated Instruction Using Benjamin Bloom's Taxonomy : http://www.suite101.com/content/blooms-taxonomy-in-the-classroom-a193162

2 comments:

  1. It is not often that students delve deep enough to discover the other two domains of Bloom's Taxonomy - often it is merely the cognitive domain that is used. And his cognitive domain is still contemporary, topical and highly relevant to what we do.

    I am momentarily distracted though, wondering if the Affective domain is also very important, particularly when facing cultural and legal issues online. I wonder if it should be re-surfaced and used to frame our management of cyber-legals and cyber-safety? What do you think?

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  2. I think that using the Affective domain as a guide to manage online learning would be a great way to administer cyber-legals and cyber-safety. This frame in particular identifies the values and issues which is extremely important when ever using online learning. It is the final piece that helps students identify the cultural and legal issues within their information, which in result creates an evaluation of their content used.

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