Bloom’s Taxonomy visualized.
The image above is a representation of Bloom’s Taxonomy, a way to classify learning objectives teachers have for their students. The taxonomy divides the learning process into two dimensions, the knowledge dimension and the cognitive process dimension. Goals are found in the places where the two dimensions intersect. Teachers should have a set of objectives for their students to meet by the end of the semester, and this chart helps define those goals.
This chart is useful for visualizing the variety of questions we can ask of our students not just in discussion but in all of their assignments, reading guides, and study guides. You can use this chart as a jumping off point to adding more variety to the questions you pose in discussion and to make a more sensible series of questions to guide your students through a set of materials (it’s easiest to work from the squares nearest us and build to the squares further away).
I found myself focusing on remembering and understanding facts and concepts in my reading guides and quizzes but jumping to analyzing and evaluating facts, concepts, and procedures in discussion and paper prompts. I have since begun adding more variety from this chart. Students can get fatigued by answering the same kinds of questions repeatedly and it’s good to constantly refresh the skills in every box on the chart. By adding more variety to the questions you ask, you help students better understand the material and stay more engaged.
Learn more about Bloom’s Taxonomy at Iowa State’s Center for Excellence in Learning and Teaching.
What kinds of questions do you like to ask your students in discussion? Where do they fit on this chart?