Objectives of Teaching and Bloom's Taxonomy

These three words differ in scope, and the difference is tested. An aim is a broad, long-term, general direction of education (for example, “the development of good citizenship”). A goal is narrower and tied to a programme or stage (for example, “the school will achieve 100 percent functional literacy”). An objective is specific, short-term and observable, stated in terms of what the learner will be able to do after instruction. An instructional (behavioural) objective is the most specific form. A learning outcome is the programme- or course-level statement of what a learner will know and be able to do at the end, and is the unit of Outcome-Based Education (OBE), which is central to NEP 2020 and NAAC accreditation. A badly written objective uses vague verbs such as “know”, “understand” or “appreciate”; a good one uses a measurable action verb such as “define”, “classify”, “calculate” or “design.”

Ralph Tyler (1949) gave the objectives-centred curriculum model and insisted that objectives should state both the behaviour and the content. Benjamin Bloom (1956) led a group that classified educational objectives into three domains. Robert Mager (1962) popularised precise behavioural objectives with three components: the performance (what the learner will do), the conditions under which it is done, and the criterion (the standard of acceptable performance). The ABCD format (Audience, Behaviour, Condition, Degree) is a later classroom-friendly formulation of the same idea. The RCEM (Regional College of Education, Mysore) scheme, developed in India on Bloom’s model, groups cognitive objectives as Knowledge, Understanding, Application and Skill. A question asking “which of Tyler, Mager and Bloom contributed to objective-writing?” has the answer “all, at different stages.”

Bloom’s taxonomy is a hierarchy: each level builds on the one below it, from simple recall to complex judgment. The 1956 categories, from lowest to highest, are:

1. Knowledge: recalling facts, terms, dates, definitions, sequences. Verbs: define, list, name, recall, state.

2. Comprehension: understanding meaning; interpreting, translating, summarising, explaining in one’s own words. Verbs: explain, describe, summarise, paraphrase.

3. Application: using learned rules, methods or principles in a new situation. Verbs: apply, solve, demonstrate, use.

4. Analysis: breaking material into parts and seeing relationships and organisation. Verbs: analyse, compare, differentiate, examine.

5. Synthesis: putting parts together to form a new whole; originality. Verbs: design, compose, construct, formulate.

6. Evaluation: judging value against criteria. Verbs: judge, critique, justify, appraise.

A useful way to see the logic: knowledge and comprehension are lower-order thinking; application is the bridge; analysis, synthesis and evaluation are higher-order thinking. An item that asks a student to “critique the methodology of a research paper” is evaluation, one that asks them to “explain why objects fall at the same rate” is comprehension, and one that asks them to “use the law to calculate” is application.

A group led by Lorin Anderson and David Krathwohl (Bloom’s former student) revised the taxonomy in 2001. Three changes are repeatedly tested: (1) nouns were replaced by verbs (Knowledge → Remember, Comprehension → Understand, Application → Apply, Analysis → Analyse); (2) Synthesis was renamed Create and placed at the top; (3) Evaluation moved below Create. So the new order is Remember, Understand, Apply, Analyse, Evaluate, Create. The revision also added a second dimension, the knowledge dimension, with four types: factual, conceptual, procedural and metacognitive knowledge. A learning objective is therefore a combination of a verb (cognitive process) and a noun (type of knowledge). Remember the difference in the order of the top two levels: in 1956 evaluation was the peak, in 2001 creation is the peak.

The affective domain deals with feelings, attitudes, interests and values. Its five levels run from simple awareness to a value that governs one’s whole behaviour: Receiving (willingness to attend), Responding (active participation or reacting), Valuing (attaching worth to something, showing commitment), Organisation (arranging values into a system and resolving conflicts between them) and Characterisation by a value or value complex (behaviour becomes consistent with the internalised value system, becoming part of one’s character). Mnemonic: R-R-V-O-C. Example mapping: a student who listens to a talk on honesty (receiving), discusses it (responding), declares honesty important (valuing), balances honesty against loyalty (organisation) and lives consistently by it (characterisation). “Appreciating classical music” is an affective objective, not a cognitive one.

The psychomotor domain concerns physical skills and coordination. Three taxonomies are named in exams. Dave (1970) has five levels: Imitation, Manipulation, Precision, Articulation, Naturalisation (mnemonic: I-M-P-A-N). Simpson (1972) has seven: Perception, Set, Guided Response, Mechanism, Complex Overt Response, Adaptation and Origination. Harrow (1972) has six: Reflex movements, Basic fundamental movements, Perceptual abilities, Physical abilities, Skilled movements and Non-discursive communication. In every scheme the movement goes from conscious, clumsy copying to automatic, fluent and finally creative performance.