Objectives, evaluation, and the improvement of education

Abstract

For five years, from 1995 until 2000, a group of eight educators and researchers met twice annually in Syracuse, NY, for the purpose of revising Bloom's Taxonomy. Based in part on the structure of educational objectives, in part on advances in cognitive psychology, and in part on numerous other attempts to classify educational objectives that were made since the publication of Bloom's Taxonomy, this group produced a two-dimensional table, known simply as the Taxonomy Table. The horizontal dimension was a modification of Bloom's Taxonomy, with verb forms replacing the noun forms of the original category labels: Remember, Understand, Apply, Analyze, Evaluate, and Create. The vertical dimension consisted of four types of knowledge: Factual Knowledge, Conceptual Knowledge, Procedural Knowledge, and Metacognitive Knowledge. The purposes of this article are to (1) describe the major differences between the original Taxonomy and the Taxonomy Table, (2) discuss ways in which the Taxonomy Table can be used to examine and ultimately improve the quality of assessment and instruction, and (3) explore how the Taxonomy Table can be used to provide more accurate estimates of curriculum alignment and opportunity to learn.