A meaningfully stated objective, […] is one that succeeds in communicating your intent; the best statement is the one that excludes the greatest number of possible alternatives to your goal.— Robert F. Mager
Learning objectives describe what a learner should be able to do at the end of each lesson. Your course should also have high level objectives that describe what your students should be able to do once they have completed it. They inform the activities in a course and determine the types of assessments that you will use to measure students’ performance. For this reason, they must be specific, observable, and measurable.
Objectives generally have four parts, however conditions and criterion may or may not be included depending on the context:
Avoiding the Common Pitfall of Objective Writing
Do not fall into the habit of using ambiguous words that are open to many interpretations, such as:
- To know
- To understand
- To appreciate
- To enjoy
Rather, ask yourself: what should the learner be doing to demonstrate that they know, understand or appreciate something? Bloom’s Taxonomy is a multi-tiered scale that can help you articulate your learning objectives in a measurable manner. It describes the degree to which you want students to use the concepts taught in class and facilitates the selection of an assessment strategy for your course.