Creating Learning Objectives and Assessment Criteria

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Creating Learning Objectives and Assessment
Criteria

• The BCC Assessment Team

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What Learning Objectives are NOT

• Course requirements (e.g., a 10 page paper)
• Course content per se (e.g., the four great
  Shakespearean tragedies)
• Absolutely everything you expect a student to
  know or be able to do as a result of taking your
  particular course

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What learning objectives are

• Expected learning outcomes or learning goals
  essential to any section of that course
• Typically five or six of these will form the core
  of what students should be able to do as a result
  of taking the course

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Learning objectives are sometimes divided into
two categories

• Subject matter objectives
• Developmental objectives

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Examples of subject matter objectives

• Students will identify the anatomy and physiology
  of the speech mechanism
• Students will detect and avoid fallacious
  reasoning

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Examples of Developmental Objectives

• Cognitive objectives e.g., students will
  demonstrate critical thinking skills
• Affective objectives e.g., students will
  demonstrate an awareness of personal values

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Subject matter objectives tend to be more
specific developmental objectives tend to be
more general.

• For this reason, learning objectives at the
  course level are typically subject matter
  objectives.

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An example of a problematic learning objective

• Students should be familiar with the principles
  and theories of psychology.

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Whats problematic about this objective?

• Given the breadth of psychology, this objective
  is probably too broad.
• The word familiar is too vague what exactly
  constitutes familiarity with a theory?
• Regarding both of the above, ask yourself how
  will the achievement of this objective be
  demonstrated?

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Learning objectives are also often confused with
course objectives, e.g., To familiarize
students with the process of photosynthesis.

• Whats the difference?

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A learning objective has the individual learner
as a focus i.e.,

• its about what the student should be able to do,
  not what the instructor hopes to cover in the
  course.

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Its a matter of perspective, but the perspective
is important.
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General Tip Consult the language of Blooms
Taxonomy of the Cognitive Domain

• Examples define, name, solve, demonstrate,
  create, categorize, use, etc.
• By being behaviorally specified, these can all be
  measured to some degree.

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What are Assessment Criteria?

• Specific tasks or demonstrable characteristics
  that allow one to evaluate the extent to which a
  learning objective has been met.
• Here course requirements are acceptable, provided
  that it is clear how the required assignment
  measures the outcome relevant to the objective.

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An example of a learning objective and a
corresponding assessment criterion

• Students will detect and avoid fallacious
  reasoning

• Students will identify informal fallacies in
  newspaper and magazine editorials students will
  write their own argumentative essays that are
  free of such fallacies.

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You should expect that developing good assessment
criteria will cause you to reassess learning
objectives

• and that clarifying learning objectives will
  cause you to develop novel ways of teaching and
  assessing learning.