Bloom's taxonomy is a framework for categorizing educational goals, developed by a committee of educators chaired by Benjamin Bloom in 1956. It was first introduced in the publication Taxonomy of Educational Objectives: The Classification of Educational Goals. The taxonomy divides learning objectives into three broad domains: cognitive (knowledge-based), affective (emotion-based), and psychomotor (action-based), each with a hierarchy of skills and abilities. These domains are used by educators to structure curricula, assessments, and teaching methods to foster different types of learning.
The cognitive domain, the most widely recognized component of the taxonomy, was originally divided into six levels: Knowledge, Comprehension, Application, Analysis, Synthesis, and Evaluation. In 2001, this taxonomy was revised, renaming and reordering the levels as Remember, Understand, Apply, Analyze, Evaluate, and Create. This domain focuses on intellectual skills and the development of critical thinking and problem-solving abilities.
The affective domain addresses attitudes, emotions, and feelings, moving from basic awareness and responsiveness to more complex values and beliefs. This domain outlines five levels: Receiving, Responding, Valuing, Organizing, and Characterizing.
The psychomotor domain, less elaborated by Bloom's original team, pertains to physical skills and the use of motor functions. Subsequent educators, such as Elizabeth Simpson, further developed this domain, outlining levels of skill acquisition from simple perceptions to the origination of new movements.
Bloom's taxonomy has become a widely adopted tool in education, influencing instructional design, assessment strategies, and learning outcomes across various disciplines. Despite its broad application, the taxonomy has also faced criticism, particularly regarding the hierarchical structure of cognitive skills and its implications for teaching and assessment practices.
The publication of Taxonomy of Educational Objectives followed a series of conferences from 1949 to 1953, which were designed to improve communication between educators on the design of curricula and examinations. [1] The models were named after Benjamin Bloom, who chaired the committee of educators that devised the taxonomy. He also edited the first volume of the standard text, Taxonomy of Educational Objectives: The Classification of Educational Goals. [2] [3]
The first volume of the taxonomy, Handbook I: Cognitive [2] was published in 1956, and in 1964 the second volume Handbook II: Affective was published. [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] A revised version of the taxonomy for the cognitive domain was created in 2001. [9]
In the 1956 original version of the taxonomy, the cognitive domain is divided into six levels of objectives. [10] In the 2001 revised edition of Bloom's taxonomy, the levels were renamed and reordered: Remember, Understand, Apply, Analyze, Evaluate, and Create. [11]
Skills in the affective domain describe the way people react emotionally and their ability to feel other living things' pain or joy. Affective objectives typically target the awareness and growth in attitudes, emotion, and feelings.
There are five levels in the affective domain, moving through the lowest-order processes to the highest:
Skills in the psychomotor domain describe the ability to physically manipulate tools or instruments, such as using a hand or a hammer. Objectives in this domain often focus on the development and change of physical skills or behavior.
Although Bloom and his colleagues did not create subcategories for the psychomotor domain, later educators, such as Elizabeth Simpson, proposed a taxonomy for psychomotor skills. Simpson’s taxonomy, introduced in 1972, categorizes psychomotor learning into seven levels, each describing progressively complex physical skills and behaviors. [12] These levels include:
This taxonomy helps educators frame psychomotor objectives in contexts such as vocational training, sports, and performing arts, where physical dexterity is central to learning outcomes. [13]
In the appendix to Handbook I, knowledge is defined as involving the recall of specifics, methods, and structures. This definition is a cornerstone of the taxonomy of educational goals, widely applied beyond education, notably in knowledge management. Knowledge is categorized into specific domains: the recall of terminology and facts, understanding methods and conventions, and recognizing patterns and principles in various fields. This framework highlights the complexity of knowledge, spanning from concrete specifics to abstract theories. [14]
Richard W. Morshead criticized the original taxonomy, noting that it was not a properly constructed taxonomy as it lacked a systematic rationale of construction. [15] This was later acknowledged in the 2001 revision, where the taxonomy was restructured on more systematic lines. [9] [ page needed ]
Some critiques of the taxonomy's cognitive domain accept the six categories but question the existence of a sequential, hierarchical link. [16] Often, educators may see the taxonomy as a hierarchy and mistakenly dismiss the lower levels as less important for teaching. [17] [18] In response, others have argued that the learning of lower levels supports the development of skills at higher levels, and in certain fields, the most critical skills may reside in the lower levels, such as species identification in natural history. [17] [18] Instructional scaffolding from lower-level to higher-level skills is an application of Vygotskian constructivism. [19] [20]
While some consider the three lower levels hierarchically ordered and the three higher levels parallel, [9] others argue that it can be beneficial to move to application before introducing concepts, particularly in problem-based learning environments where real-world contexts precede theoretical understanding.[ citation needed ]
The distinction between categories can be seen as artificial, since cognitive tasks often involve multiple processes. [21] Categorizing mental processes into distinct classifications may undermine the interconnected nature of cognition, a critique commonly directed at taxonomies of mental processes. Despite this, the taxonomy is widely used in educational settings to structure learning outcomes, though a 2020 study revealed inconsistencies between institutions in the mapping of action verbs to the taxonomy's levels. [22]
Bloom's taxonomy serves as the backbone of many teaching philosophies, in particular, those that lean more towards skills rather than content. [8] [9] These educators view content as a vessel for teaching skills. The emphasis on higher-order thinking inherent in such philosophies is based on the top levels of the taxonomy including application, analysis, synthesis, and evaluation.[ citation needed ] Bloom's taxonomy can be used as a teaching tool to help balance evaluative and assessment-based questions in assignments, texts, and class engagements to ensure that all orders of thinking are exercised in students' learning, including aspects of information searching. [23]
Bloom's taxonomy is a source of inspiration for educational philosophy and for developing new teaching strategies, particularly in light of trends in developing global focus on multiple literacies and modalities in learning and the emerging field of integrated disciplines. [24] For example, ability to interface with and create media draws upon skills from both higher and lower-order thinking skills. [25] [26]
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to education:
Educational psychology is the branch of psychology concerned with the scientific study of human learning. The study of learning processes, from both cognitive and behavioral perspectives, allows researchers to understand individual differences in intelligence, cognitive development, affect, motivation, self-regulation, and self-concept, as well as their role in learning. The field of educational psychology relies heavily on quantitative methods, including testing and measurement, to enhance educational activities related to instructional design, classroom management, and assessment, which serve to facilitate learning processes in various educational settings across the lifespan.
Robert Mills Gagné was an American educational psychologist best known for his Conditions of Learning. He instructed during World War II when he worked with the Army Air Corps training pilots. He went on to develop a series of studies and works that simplified and explained what he and others believed to be good instruction. Gagné was also involved in applying concepts of instructional theory to the design of computer-based training and multimedia-based learning. His work is sometimes summarized as the Gagné assumption: that different types of learning exist, and that different instructional conditions are most likely to bring about these different types of learning.
Instructional design (ID), also known as instructional systems design and originally known as instructional systems development (ISD), is the practice of systematically designing, developing and delivering instructional materials and experiences, both digital and physical, in a consistent and reliable fashion toward an efficient, effective, appealing, engaging and inspiring acquisition of knowledge. The process consists broadly of determining the state and needs of the learner, defining the end goal of instruction, and creating some "intervention" to assist in the transition. The outcome of this instruction may be directly observable and scientifically measured or completely hidden and assumed. There are many instructional design models, but many are based on the ADDIE model with the five phases: analysis, design, development, implementation, and evaluation.
Active learning is "a method of learning in which students are actively or experientially involved in the learning process and where there are different levels of active learning, depending on student involvement." Bonwell & Eison (1991) states that "students participate [in active learning] when they are doing something besides passively listening." According to Hanson and Moser (2003) using active teaching techniques in the classroom can create better academic outcomes for students. Scheyvens, Griffin, Jocoy, Liu, & Bradford (2008) further noted that "by utilizing learning strategies that can include small-group work, role-play and simulations, data collection and analysis, active learning is purported to increase student interest and motivation and to build students ‘critical thinking, problem-solving and social skills". In a report from the Association for the Study of Higher Education, authors discuss a variety of methodologies for promoting active learning. They cite literature that indicates students must do more than just listen in order to learn. They must read, write, discuss, and be engaged in solving problems. This process relates to the three learning domains referred to as knowledge, skills and attitudes (KSA). This taxonomy of learning behaviors can be thought of as "the goals of the learning process." In particular, students must engage in such higher-order thinking tasks as analysis, synthesis, and evaluation.
Benjamin Samuel Bloom was an American educational psychologist who made contributions to the classification of educational objectives and to the theory of mastery learning. He is particularly noted for leading educational psychologists to develop the comprehensive system of describing and assessing educational outcomes in the mid-1950s. He has influenced the practices and philosophies of educators around the world from the latter part of the twentieth century.
This is an index of education articles.
Mastery learning is an instructional strategy and educational philosophy that emphasizes the importance of students achieving a high level of competence in prerequisite knowledge before moving on to new material. This approach involves providing students with individualized support and repeated opportunities to demonstrate mastery through assessments. If a student does not initially achieve mastery, they receive additional instruction and support until they do. Mastery learning is based on the idea that all students can learn effectively with appropriate instruction and sufficient time, and it contrasts with traditional teaching methods that often focus on covering a set amount of material within a fixed timeframe, regardless of individual student needs.
This glossary of education-related terms is based on how they commonly are used in Wikipedia articles. This article contains terms starting with A – C. Select a letter from the table of contents to find terms on other articles.
This glossary of education-related terms is based on how they commonly are used in Wikipedia articles. This article contains terms starting with T – Z. Select a letter from the table of contents to find terms on other articles.
Cultural competence, also known as intercultural competence, is a range of cognitive, affective, behavioural, and linguistic skills that lead to effective and appropriate communication with people of other cultures. Intercultural or cross-cultural education are terms used for the training to achieve cultural competence.
David Reading Krathwohl was an American educational psychologist. He was the director of the Bureau of Educational Research at Michigan State University and was also a past president of the American Educational Research Association, where he served in multiple capacities, as a member of the research advisory committee for the Bureau of Research of the USOE and as regional chairman of the board of trusties of the Eastern Regional Institute for Education.
Higher-order thinking, also known as higher order thinking skills (HOTS), is a concept applied in relation to education reform and based on learning taxonomies. The idea is that some types of learning require more cognitive processing than others, but also have more generalized benefits. In Bloom's taxonomy, for example, skills involving analysis, evaluation and synthesis are thought to be of a higher order than the learning of facts and concepts using lower-order thinking skills, which require different learning and teaching methods. Higher-order thinking involves the learning of complex judgmental skills such as critical thinking and problem solving.
Dialogue Education is a popular education approach to adult education first described by educator and entrepreneur Jane Vella in the 1980s. This approach to education is a proprietary commercial product licensed by Vermont-based company Global Learning Partners that draws on various adult learning theories, including those of Paulo Freire, Kurt Lewin, Malcolm Knowles and Benjamin Bloom. It is a synthesis of these theories into principles and practices that can be applied in a concrete way to learning design and facilitation. Dialogue Education is a form of Constructivism and can be a means for Transformative learning,.
Although the noun forms of the three words aim, objective and goal are often used synonymously, professionals in organised education define the educational aims and objectives more narrowly and consider them to be distinct from each other: aims are concerned with purpose whereas objectives are concerned with achievement.
Williams' taxonomy is a hierarchical arrangement of eight creative thinking skills conceived, developed, and researched by Frank E. Williams, a researcher in educational psychology. The taxonomy forms the basis of a differentiated instruction curriculum model used particularly with gifted students and in gifted education settings.
Critical understanding is a term used commonly in education to define a mode of thinking, described as, ‘an essential tool for participating in democratic processes, at whatever level.’ It is a defensible position reached through the examination of ideas, issues or sources. It is achieved through reflecting upon, analysing and evaluating different ideas and positions, and is demonstrated through an ability to express informed responses and independent thought. Critical understanding develops through analytical and independent thought and is considered an increasingly important element of the education process as students progress to higher and further education. However it is not an easy concept to communicate for it is not a passive thing we do; it is about active engagement.
Cognitive rigor is a combined model developed by superimposing two existing models for describing rigor that are widely accepted in the education system in the United States. The concept "is marked and measured by the depth and extent students are challenged and engaged to demonstrate and communicate their knowledge and thinking" and also "marks and measures the depth and complexity of student learning experiences."
In education, authentic learning is an instructional approach that allows students to explore, discuss, and meaningfully construct concepts and relationships in contexts that involve real-world problems and projects that are relevant to the learner. It refers to a "wide variety of educational and instructional techniques focused on connecting what students are taught in school to real-world issues, problems, and applications. The basic idea is that students are more likely to be interested in what they are learning, more motivated to learn new concepts and skills, and better prepared to succeed in college, careers, and adulthood if what they are learning mirrors real-life contexts, equips them with practical and useful skills, and addresses topics that are relevant and applicable to their lives outside of school."
The term learning environment can refer to an educational approach, cultural context, or physical setting in which teaching and learning occur. The term is commonly used as a more definitive alternative to "classroom", but it typically refers to the context of educational philosophy or knowledge experienced by the student and may also encompass a variety of learning cultures—its presiding ethos and characteristics, how individuals interact, governing structures, and philosophy. In a societal sense, learning environment may refer to the culture of the population it serves and of their location. Learning environments are highly diverse in use, learning styles, organization, and educational institution. The culture and context of a place or organization includes such factors as a way of thinking, behaving, or working, also known as organizational culture. For a learning environment such as an educational institution, it also includes such factors as operational characteristics of the instructors, instructional group, or institution; the philosophy or knowledge experienced by the student and may also encompass a variety of learning cultures—its presiding ethos and characteristics, how individuals interact, governing structures, and philosophy in learning styles and pedagogies used; and the societal culture of where the learning is occurring. Although physical environments do not determine educational activities, there is evidence of a relationship between school settings and the activities that take place there.
Biology is often referred to as an observational science almost as a slur, with the implication that biologists simply look at the living world without the strong theoretical and mathematic underpinnings of a science like physics. There is the suggestion that observation is easy. Thus biology is viewed as a lightweight science—anyone can do it: just go out and start looking, at birds, at grass, at cells under the microscope. Benjamin Bloom's taxonomy of learning tasks puts observation at the lowest level, with recall of information. This denigration of observation has long bothered me because I see it as often difficult and complex, a skill that needs to be learned and a talent that is much more developed in some.
Ironically, the dogma that has been so detrimental to field taxonomy is known as Bloom's taxonomy. University lecturers are told to apply an educational theory developed by Benjamin Bloom, which categorises assessment tasks and learning activities into cognitive domains. In Bloom's taxonomy, identifying and naming are at the lowest level of cognitive skills and have been systematically excluded from University degrees because they are considered simplistic.
When supporting students outside the classroom situation, a subject aware advisor should be capable of spotting mistakes in a student's solution and of analysing these mistakes to identify the difficulty that the student is encountering. Such support can be seen as offering scaffolding in a student's 'zone of proximal development' (Vygotsky, 1978) and exemplified by teaching students to analyse a problem through the identification of the key elements and the relationships between these elements.