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A Taxonomy for Learning, Teaching, and Assessing: A Revision of Bloom's Taxonomy of Educational Objectives
B> This revision of Bloom's taxonomy is designed to help teachers understand and implement standards-based curriculums. Cognitive psychologists, curriculum specialists, teacher educators, and researchers have developed a two-dimensional framework, focusing on knowledge and cognitive processes. In combination, these two define what students are expected tolearn in school. Like no other text, it explores curriculums from three unique perspectives-cognitive psychologists (learning emphasis), curriculum specialists and teacher educators (C&I emphasis), and measurement and assessment experts (assessment emphasis). This "revisited" framework allows you to connect learning in all areas of curriculum. Educators, or others interested in Educational Psychology or Educational Methods for grades K-12.
336 pages, Paperback
First published December 1, 2000
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Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews
July 25, 2019
This book is a must-read for teachers of any subject. It really makes you think about the connections between course objectives, classroom activities, and assessments. I'll be utilizing a lot of ideas from this book when I plan new courses and when I revise the ones I already have.
March 8, 2014
The original taxonomy was created by educational evaluators (the people who write tests for college courses). It was geared toward helping them share different type of test questions. I find it does not work as well for creating training.
This taxonomy makes a lot more sense than the original one. I like that this one doesn't assume you're incapable of operating at a higher level in the taxonomy without completing the lower level. I also like that it goes into much more detail about how to use it for learning and teaching.
It also focuses on a new purpose for the taxonomy--identifying whether the objectives, teaching activities, and assessments all align with one another--that's helpful when you're reviewing a course. However, it only goes so far as to identify whether the same cognitive processes are used--in your objectives, teaching, and assessments. For example, if your objective is to have students learn to write a paper about how political science principles play out in history, but your lesson asks students to design a bicycle, the method in this book would say they align because they use the same cognitive processes.
The taxonomy also adds a new dimension--a knowledge dimension (making the taxonomy a matrix). At any level of cognitive process in the taxonomy (remember, understand, apply, etc.), there four knowledge dimensions: factual, conceptual (concepts, principles, and frameworks or mental models), procedural (algorithms and heuristics), and metacognitive. I like that this help clarify that something can be factual but still be understanding, or can be conceptual but only at the remember level, etc. However, it does become a little awkward because most objectives at a particular cognitive level tend to apply to just one level. For example, even though you can draw on facts and concepts when you're applying something, most application-level objectives tend to focus on procedural knowledge. Similarly, most understanding-level objectives tend to focus on conceptual knowledge.
Also, the specific knowledge areas can be a bit confusing at first. "Conceptual" includes not only concepts, but also principles and mental models. "Procedural" includes both procedures and the heuristic portion of problem solving (mental models are already covered as part of "conceptual"). This means that there's no way to look at the placement of an objective in the taxonomy table and tell whether it addresses problem solving or not.
The taxonomy also completely revamped the sub-categories of the cognitive area. I found the restructuring here to be very thoughtfully done. The original sub-categories were not especially useful for creating training--as witnessed by the fact that most people didn't even know they existed. I'd never even heard of them until I made the effort to actually locate and read the original taxonomy (the 200-page book, not the basic six-category summaries you see floating around). In the new taxonomy, each sub-category is a slightly different cognitive process, and therefore requires a different instructional method (for example, the two sub-categories in "remember" are "recognize" and "recall"). If one were to expand the taxonomy table so that each cell represented a sub-category of cognitive process and knowledge type, it could become a effective task analysis tool to identify the types of skills required by different activities. You could then use these to craft objectives, teaching activities, and assessments that should (in theory) all align. Of course the caveat stated above--where papers on political science and designing bicycles might look the same--applies here too.
This taxonomy makes a lot more sense than the original one. I like that this one doesn't assume you're incapable of operating at a higher level in the taxonomy without completing the lower level. I also like that it goes into much more detail about how to use it for learning and teaching.
It also focuses on a new purpose for the taxonomy--identifying whether the objectives, teaching activities, and assessments all align with one another--that's helpful when you're reviewing a course. However, it only goes so far as to identify whether the same cognitive processes are used--in your objectives, teaching, and assessments. For example, if your objective is to have students learn to write a paper about how political science principles play out in history, but your lesson asks students to design a bicycle, the method in this book would say they align because they use the same cognitive processes.
The taxonomy also adds a new dimension--a knowledge dimension (making the taxonomy a matrix). At any level of cognitive process in the taxonomy (remember, understand, apply, etc.), there four knowledge dimensions: factual, conceptual (concepts, principles, and frameworks or mental models), procedural (algorithms and heuristics), and metacognitive. I like that this help clarify that something can be factual but still be understanding, or can be conceptual but only at the remember level, etc. However, it does become a little awkward because most objectives at a particular cognitive level tend to apply to just one level. For example, even though you can draw on facts and concepts when you're applying something, most application-level objectives tend to focus on procedural knowledge. Similarly, most understanding-level objectives tend to focus on conceptual knowledge.
Also, the specific knowledge areas can be a bit confusing at first. "Conceptual" includes not only concepts, but also principles and mental models. "Procedural" includes both procedures and the heuristic portion of problem solving (mental models are already covered as part of "conceptual"). This means that there's no way to look at the placement of an objective in the taxonomy table and tell whether it addresses problem solving or not.
The taxonomy also completely revamped the sub-categories of the cognitive area. I found the restructuring here to be very thoughtfully done. The original sub-categories were not especially useful for creating training--as witnessed by the fact that most people didn't even know they existed. I'd never even heard of them until I made the effort to actually locate and read the original taxonomy (the 200-page book, not the basic six-category summaries you see floating around). In the new taxonomy, each sub-category is a slightly different cognitive process, and therefore requires a different instructional method (for example, the two sub-categories in "remember" are "recognize" and "recall"). If one were to expand the taxonomy table so that each cell represented a sub-category of cognitive process and knowledge type, it could become a effective task analysis tool to identify the types of skills required by different activities. You could then use these to craft objectives, teaching activities, and assessments that should (in theory) all align. Of course the caveat stated above--where papers on political science and designing bicycles might look the same--applies here too.
June 22, 2013
A necesssary introduction to joined-up teaching, this book has filled a gap in my own professional education. The gap between lesson planning, which I studied for my CELTA ,and syllabus planning, which I studied for my MEd. This book focuses on planning course units spread over 5-25 lessons. Its quite shocking that you can get as far as I have in teacher education without tackling course units, or hearing about Bloom's Taxonomy .
This revision of Bloom's work is quite radical, re-presenting it as a two-dimensional framework applied not only to educational objectives, but also to instructional activities and assessment practices. The goal behind this is alignment: that we assess what we have taught, and what we have taught is what we set out to teach in the first place.
The framework consists of a knowledge dimension (factual, conceptual, procedural and metacognitive) and a cognitive process dimension (remember, understand, apply, analyse, evaluate and create). Despite the assertion that the framework has been based on the latest cognitive science, there is little in-text referencing to that science cf Why don't Students like school. More convincing is the claim that Bloom's original definitions of have been modified to reflect teachers' actual usage of such terms. In fact the whole book reads more as an attempt to systemitise the way teachers talk about what they do: and the analysis is linguistic rather than cognitive. In fact reflecting on both Anderson's and Willingham's work, I am sadly reminded how far away we still are from a pedagogy based on cognitive or neurological science.
The reversion to the way teachers actually talk about what they do seems retrograde, the enshrinement of folk psychology in educational terminology. I know that from a philosopical persepctive there are difficulties subordinating factual under conceptual knowledge. Factual knowledge is a instance of conceptual knowledge, if I meaningfully say "Mt Etna is a volcano" I have to know what a 'volcano' is. What I don't know is whether it is educationally useful to get a child to remember that 'Mt Etna is a volcano' before or after he understands what a volcano is. This book, despite offering 'hierarchies' of knowledge and cognitive process doesn't seem to answer that question, saying instead that teachers do teach factual before conceptual knowledge. The 'Addition Facts Vignette' most broadly illustrates my reservations, as it seems mostly about teaching the conceptual relations between numbers rather than a series of addition facts, which seem to be the result of the child repeatedly grasping the addition concepts.
I look forward to the time when teaching is built on scientific foundations in the way that medicine or engineering is, in the meantime teachers will have to rely on the traditions and personal insights that we have always relied on. This book has a well deserved place in that tradition.
This revision of Bloom's work is quite radical, re-presenting it as a two-dimensional framework applied not only to educational objectives, but also to instructional activities and assessment practices. The goal behind this is alignment: that we assess what we have taught, and what we have taught is what we set out to teach in the first place.
The framework consists of a knowledge dimension (factual, conceptual, procedural and metacognitive) and a cognitive process dimension (remember, understand, apply, analyse, evaluate and create). Despite the assertion that the framework has been based on the latest cognitive science, there is little in-text referencing to that science cf Why don't Students like school. More convincing is the claim that Bloom's original definitions of have been modified to reflect teachers' actual usage of such terms. In fact the whole book reads more as an attempt to systemitise the way teachers talk about what they do: and the analysis is linguistic rather than cognitive. In fact reflecting on both Anderson's and Willingham's work, I am sadly reminded how far away we still are from a pedagogy based on cognitive or neurological science.
The reversion to the way teachers actually talk about what they do seems retrograde, the enshrinement of folk psychology in educational terminology. I know that from a philosopical persepctive there are difficulties subordinating factual under conceptual knowledge. Factual knowledge is a instance of conceptual knowledge, if I meaningfully say "Mt Etna is a volcano" I have to know what a 'volcano' is. What I don't know is whether it is educationally useful to get a child to remember that 'Mt Etna is a volcano' before or after he understands what a volcano is. This book, despite offering 'hierarchies' of knowledge and cognitive process doesn't seem to answer that question, saying instead that teachers do teach factual before conceptual knowledge. The 'Addition Facts Vignette' most broadly illustrates my reservations, as it seems mostly about teaching the conceptual relations between numbers rather than a series of addition facts, which seem to be the result of the child repeatedly grasping the addition concepts.
I look forward to the time when teaching is built on scientific foundations in the way that medicine or engineering is, in the meantime teachers will have to rely on the traditions and personal insights that we have always relied on. This book has a well deserved place in that tradition.
February 27, 2010
This revision of Bloom's functions as a useful tool for helping educators articulate what outcomes that we want for our students in all of their complexity. The authors have taken the original taxonomy and expanded it to include a new dimension of knowledge that works in concert with a revised vision of the cognitive processes of the original. This text articulates the changes and explicitly defines the terms of each dimension. While not the most captivating of reads, educators should engage in the ideas here because they form a useful framework for the type of dialogue that we need to be having about what it is that we do for students, and how we assess whether or not students are accomplishing those goals.
March 5, 2009
This follow up to Bloom's Taxonomy is an excellent update. It's practical and upfront. More of us in the teaching profession should think about our lessons at this depth (but we don't).
I have read and re-read sections, recreated the graph into pyramids and bulls-eye target graphics, and then I come back to the plain rows and columns because they are so much more useful.
I can't seem to convince fellow teachers to read the book. A lot of folks nod their heads and go about their business.
I have read and re-read sections, recreated the graph into pyramids and bulls-eye target graphics, and then I come back to the plain rows and columns because they are so much more useful.
I can't seem to convince fellow teachers to read the book. A lot of folks nod their heads and go about their business.
November 12, 2012
Is a great book!
December 20, 2024
great systematic approach, by reading it you do realize how much cognitive traps you set for yourself in the learning process and ultimately fail, this book really helps to break those chains
August 10, 2019
I had heard about Bloom's Taxonomy in the general sense, so I wanted to get a little more background on it. I do think this taxonomy is helpful, and I like the updates. I was hoping for a little more in the way of specific suggestions on how to best teach/assess each cell, though, and there wasn't much of that. I realized skimming through the appendices that the original book devoted a lot of space to assessment examples, so I'll have to pick that one up.
March 18, 2008
Good information, but very very dry.
February 15, 2014
Heavy. Reads like a textbook.
Read
January 13, 2026Bloom’s Taxonomy* presents a clear and structured way to understand how human thinking develops in stages. The model outlines six levels of cognitive thinking, ranging from basic recall of information to higher-order skills like analysis, evaluation, and creation. Its main strength is the simplicity of its progression, showing that deeper understanding is built on foundational knowledge.
The framework is widely used in education because it helps organize learning goals and encourages critical thinking rather than memorization alone. Although the model can feel rigid if applied too strictly, its flexibility allows it to be adapted across subjects and learning styles.
Overall, *Bloom’s Taxonomy* is an influential and practical concept that continues to shape how learning and thinking are approached, emphasizing growth from simple understanding to complex reasoning.
The framework is widely used in education because it helps organize learning goals and encourages critical thinking rather than memorization alone. Although the model can feel rigid if applied too strictly, its flexibility allows it to be adapted across subjects and learning styles.
Overall, *Bloom’s Taxonomy* is an influential and practical concept that continues to shape how learning and thinking are approached, emphasizing growth from simple understanding to complex reasoning.
September 13, 2019
It is definitely valuable to be able to think about class objectives and make sure your assessments are actually measuring what you aimed to teach. For putting all this into practice, however, I still prefer Charting Your Course: How to Prepare to Teach More Effectively (based on the original taxonomy, not this revised one).
May 7, 2022
This is an extraordinary book! It is collection of some of the most thoughtful & thought-provoking scholarship & practice of teaching & learning (at all levels).
It is dense and at least for me required re-reading many passages and following the references.
It is my indispensable guide!
It is dense and at least for me required re-reading many passages and following the references.
It is my indispensable guide!
June 2, 2011
YUCK! While it's a great concept and I like the Taxonomy Table with the different knowledges and such, it was so hard to read and I didn't understand half of what I read. While I want to continue improving my teaching skills and techniques, I want to read books that I can grasp and actually come away learning something.
June 13, 2012
It's a hard read that has the potential to turn off readers.
Read
April 24, 2014good
July 24, 2017
Many educators cite Bloom's regularly. I find this revision to be more accessible than the first, though the first had a little more information on where each process came from.
Read
January 17, 2016sdf
Displaying 1 - 18 of 18 reviews