Role of Objectives in the ID Process

 

WHAT ARE LEARNING OBJECTIVES?

 

The third stage of the design process is to identify the goals and objectives. "Instructional objectives are specific, measurable, short-term, observable student behaviors that are the foundation upon which you can build lessons and assessments that helps to meet the overall course or lesson goals (Martin, Florence, 2011)."This stage is a very important because this is where you determine what the learner will learn after the instructional activity. It also helps instructors to plan learning from day to day. Learning objectives help to guide the learning activities, lets the learners know what to expect from the training, and opens the door for evaluations to be conducted to measure the effectiveness. "Objectives help to activate a mental set that focuses student attention and directs selective perception of specific lesson content (Gagne´, 1985)."

 

KEY COMPONENTS OF A LEARNING OBJECTIVE

The key components of a learning objective are all objectives should be SMART.

Specific, Measurable or observable, Attainable for the learners within planned time and planned conditions, Relevant and results-oriented, and targeted to the learner and be at the chosen learning level.

"A well-written objective should describe a learning outcome; it should not describe a learning activity. A student-oriented objective focuses on the learner, not on the teacher, and if an instructional objective is not observable (or does not describe an observable product), it leads to unclear expectations and it will be difficult to determine whether or not it had been reached (Instructional Objectives)."

 
BLOOM'S TAXONOMY

 

Benjamin Bloom with other collaborators created this framework called Bloom's Taxonomy. "Taxonomy simply means "classification," so the well-known taxonomy of learning objectives is an attempt (within the behavioral paradigm) to classify forms and levels of learning (Atherton, JS, 2013)." Bloom's taxonomy is a classification chart of multiple objectives that educators can use to create their learning objectives. The objectives are separated into six different categories such as Knowledge, Comprehension, Application, Analysis, Synthesis, and Evaluation.

 
 
EXAMPLES OF LEARNING OBJECTIVES

 

Good Examples of Effective Objectives

Be able to drive a car.

Be able to write a check.

 

 

 

   

Bad Examples of Ineffective Objectives

Be able to understand how science

Develop an appreciation for dance

 




CREATE AN EFFECTIVE LEARNING OBJECTIVE

To create an effective learning objective, begin your objective sentence with something similar to, "At the end of this training the students will be able to:"

1. Select an action word from Bloom's Taxonomy; do not use words that require an explanation or clarification.

2. To create attainable learning objectives name the condition that the performance will take place such as: on a paper exam

3. Make sure that you create objectives that target the audience and match the action verb selected.

REFERENCES

Atherton J S (2013) Learning and Teaching; Bloom's taxonomy [On-line: UK] retrieved 30 June 2014 from http://www.learningandteaching.info/learning/bloomtax.htm

Bloom's taxonomy http://www.learningandteaching.info/learning/bloomtax.htm#ixzz369XxsN6g
Under Creative Commons License: Attribution Non-Commercial No Derivatives

http://education.stateuniversity.com/pages/2098/Instructional-Objectives.html">Instructional Objectives - Characteristics of a Well-Written Objective, Characteristics of a Useful Objective, Kinds of Instructional Objectives
 

Gagne´, R. M., Wager, W. W., Golas, K. C., & Keller, J. M. (2005). Principles of instructional design (4th ed.). Belmont, CA: Wadsworth=Thompson Learning.

 
Martin, Florence. (2011). Instructional Design and the Importance of Instructional Alignment. Routledge Taylor & Francis Group, LLC.