Urganch state university

Chapter II How to Use Bloom’s Taxonomy for Curriculum Planning
2.1 Learning that reaches new heights

Think of the process of learning as a pyramid.

At the bottom – the foundation upon which everything else is built – you have the most basic and most crucial elements of what you’re teaching. Each level above depends on the one below, becoming increasingly deep, complex and cognitively-demanding until you get to the ultimate achievable level.
This, essentially, is Bloom’s Taxonomy: a structure that classifies and organizes educational goals and performance into specific, hierarchical categories. And although it was first published in 1956, it has remained popular among K-12 teachers because of the way it helps them map their curriculum, plan lessons, ask questions, deliver assignments and assess student learning from the basic to the complex, all in alignment with specific, measurable learning objectives.
So how does Bloom’s Taxonomy work… and how can it improve learning in the classroom? Let’s scale the pyramid together.

There are six levels of knowledge in Bloom’s Taxonomy: Remember, Understand, Apply, Analyse, Evaluate and Create. The higher you move up the framework, the deeper, more complex and more cognitively-demanding knowledge and skills become.
Here’s how it breaks down:
1. Remember
Students recognize and recall basic facts, concepts, processes, patterns, structures and settings. At this level, teachers might ask students to recite a poem from a textbook, remember geometric formulas or list countries on a continent.
2. Understand
Students decode the meaning and significance behind concepts, facts and ideas – and communicate them to others. At this level, students can summarize the main ideas of a story or classify different animals.
3. Apply
Students use the knowledge or skills they’ve developed in new contexts or situations. At this level, students may be expected to create a budget using mathematical concepts, write an advice column for a character in a story or paint using a particular artistic style.
4. Analyze
Students break down concepts into their component parts and identify the connections between them. At this level, students might distinguish between fact and opinion in a newspaper, deconstruct how a machine works or identify logical fallacies in an argument.
5. Evaluate
Students use the knowledge and skills they’ve gained so far to appraise a situation, state an opinion and justify their stance. At this level, students can do things like select the best source of vitamin C in a diet or critique the value of new technologies in a specific context.
6. Create
Students formulate their own solutions to problems and create original work. At this level, teachers might ask students to write a poem of their own, develop a business plan for a new company or design a machine to tackle a problem.
Full disclosure: this version of Bloom’s Taxonomy is a revision from 2001, which uses dynamic, verb-oriented language for each level and places Create as the top learning. That said, the basic concepts and outcomes remain the same. If you’re interested in the original framework, you can find more information here.
So what’s the big deal?
When Bloom’s Taxonomy was first developed, the authors wanted to better assess college student performance. But teachers soon found that it helped them plan and structure learning in classrooms at all levels, beyond just assessment:
· Setting clear and measurable classroom objectives: Because all six stages and the expectations under each are expressed as verbs, the taxonomy places its focus on observable behaviors that demonstrate student learning within a specific lesson, unit or curriculum as a whole.
· Organizing standards within a curriculum: Which standards should you address, and in what order? This framework helps outline the sequence of learning in curriculum maps, unit plans and lesson plans by identifying which standards align most closely with lower-level stages like Remember and Understand vs. those that align with higher-level stages like Analyze and Create.
· Designing appropriate assessments: For students at the Remember level, multiple-choice or true-and-false questions may be most effective; but an essay? Probably not the best approach. Using this framework, teachers can better design assessments to reflect where students are and what they’re expected to be able to know and do.
· Bridging the knowledge gap: Knowing where students are in their learning journey, and where they need to be at the end of the lesson, unit or grade level, helps identify which kinds of learning activities, textbooks and assessments will be most useful to teachers and students alike.
· Collaborating with other teachers: How will learning flow as students switch between subjects or move on to the next grade? Bloom’s Taxonomy provides a structure or scaffolding of learning that can help set expectations for progression throughout a student’s entire educational journey at your school.
Start with setting better outcomes
Writing classroom outcomes is one place where Bloom’s Taxonomy truly shines. Why? Because it pairs specific, observable behaviors that indicate learning with knowledge- and skill-level dependencies that support those objectives.
And it’s adaptable enough to do that work on many levels:
Curriculum
Bloom’s Taxonomy helps address the question, “What should students know or be able to do at the end of this year?” Most likely, these outcomes will align with grade-level standards.
Units
Breaking things down further, Bloom’s Taxonomy helps create and link unit plans by considering the behaviors through which students will show mastery of the topic they’re learning before they’re ready to move on to the next one.
Lessons
Bloom’s Taxonomy can even help map student learning within a single lesson or between lessons in support of larger unit or curriculum goals. It can also be a handy tool for selecting and structuring learning activities within each class.
No matter the type of outcome, we can recommend a few tips to follow when writing them:
– Limit each outcome to one observable, behavior-oriented verb. The more clearly you define what “mastery” means, and the more measurable it is, the better you’ll be able to gauge student progress against your objectives.
– Make sure those verbs are appropriate to each level of the taxonomy. If students are at the Apply level, for example, you can expect them to be able to do everything at Understand and Remember as well… but not Evaluate or Create.
– Avoid favoring higher-level outcomes over lower-level ones. After all, deep learning needs a strong foundation. We must remember a concept before we can understand it, and understand a concept before we can apply it meaningfully.
– Express outcomes in terms of what students will learn, rather than what will be covered in class. What skills will students demonstrate, and to what proficiency? What questions will they be able to answer?
Putting Bloom’s Taxonomy to work in your classroom
What does Bloom’s Taxonomy actually look like when used effectively in a classroom? To illustrate, here’s how it fits into each part of a curriculum map:
✏️ Standards: Align the standards that you’re teaching to the appropriate level of the taxonomy.
✏️ Sequence: Order your standards so they move from lower levels to higher levels throughout the year.
✏️ Content: Plan the key concepts, facts and events you’re teaching, moving from foundational to higher-level thinking.
✏️ Skills: Define what students should be able to do by the end of the year using verbs that match the appropriate level of the taxonomy.
✏️ Assessments: Gauge student learning using methods that reflect the complexity of each level – for example, at Understand, multiple-choice quizzes are a better option than essay-style assignments.
✏️ Activities: Plan in-class activities that help students develop their knowledge and mastery, and moving progressively from one level to the next.
✏️ Resources: Strategically choose textbooks, videos, guides, worksheets, etc. that reflect the level students are at and where they’re going next.
✏️ Essential questions: Check that students have reached class objectives by asking questions at the end of class that indicate their understanding of the content and their progress toward your objectives.
✏️ Timelines: Consider how much time it will take to move students from one level of knowledge or skill to the next.
✏️ Pacing: A pacing guide can help make sure students are progressing through the taxonomy and reaching the goals you’ve set on time.
✏️ Units: You can use the taxonomy in your unit plan to define how you’ll move from topic-to-topic over a period of time.
Mind you, Bloom’s Taxonomy isn’t the perfect solution for every situation – criticisms range from “it encourages over-reliance on a set structure without understanding the reasons behind it” to “it leads teachers to focus on higher-order levels at the expense of lower-order levels.”
That said, versatility is its greatest utility. By thinking of Bloom’s Taxonomy as a tool in our teaching toolboxes or a framework off of which we can hang lessons, learning activities, units or whole curriculums, it makes planning more effective, learning more measurable and helps ensure our students will remember, understand, apply, analyse, evaluate and create their way to mastery.
Six Levels Of Bloom’s Taxonomy & Its Importance
Wondering what do the above-mentioned levels of Bloom’s Taxonomy indicate?
Let me explain it to you step-by-step…
Level #1: Remember
Remember - it indicates the learning of students in the classroom.
Whatever a student has learned theoretically or practically, both are considered as knowledgeable aspects. Just like any other aspect of education, knowledge, though basic, but is one of the most important.
A student’s knowledge level acts as a “catalyst” in unlocking the other levels.
If a student has good knowledge, he/she can implement it in a way that no one could imagine.
So, this level could be considered as the pillar of the educational model.
Level #2: Comprehension
Comprehension indicates the level of understanding.
For instance, no matter how much a student scores in the exam & know about a concept, but the value of education would be when he/she truly understands it.
Understanding a concept to the core can be a game-changer for students who want to have a successful career ahead.
Therefore, students must focus on understanding the teachings to their depth and not take them lightly.
Level #3: Application
The third most level of Bloom’s Taxonomy is application.
As the name indicates, the application refers to the way a student learns, understands, and then applies the concept in real life.
For instance, a student learns how to write in the “English” language.
He understands it well and has a good aptitude. However, if there comes a time where his parents need to write a letter in English for urgent work then, he should be able to write the letter.
This is where he would apply his knowledge in real life.
So, if you doubt-
“Is Bloom's taxonomy a learning theory?”
I hope the query has been resolved!
Level #4: Analysis
Analyzing anything is quite an imperative task.
Just because someone says something, the students must not accept the same.
They must develop an analysis power that could differentiate between what is authentic & what’s not.
It would help the students deal with any situation in their career.
Level #5: Synthesis
Synthesis can be understood as gathering everything that is learned and then creating something new out of it. As easy as it may sound, but to reach this level, the student needs to be well prepared & has gained knowledge in depth.
The student must be at a stage to become an avid learner.
Level #6: Evaluation
Evaluation simply refers to a skill that enables students to judge anything in terms of whether it’s true or not along with giving strong reasoning.
The students can reach this stage only when all other stages are cleared. It won’t happen overnight, the entire process takes a good amount of time.
However, teachers need to encourage a student to clear all the stages & develop skills that would help them fulfill their dreams.
Revised Bloom’s Taxonomy Model in 2001 indicates the highest level to be - creation.
Level #7: Creation
Creation indicates that the student must be able to create something out of the teaching-learning process. It can be understood as a student writes a book on something or he creates a device that would help society in some way.
Creation in itself is a great achievement. It aims toward the welfare of the society – which is one of the main purposes of Bloom’s Taxonomy.
What Is Pedagogy? Importance Of Pedagogy In Teaching And Learning Process
Why Use Bloom’s Taxonomy?
The levels of Bloom's Taxonomy can aid in guiding students through the learning process, starting with remembering, understanding, evaluating, and creating. This makes it particularly beneficial for course design.
It can further help in developing assessments by assisting you in matching course learning objectives to any desired level of mastery. For instance, when teaching lower-level, introductory courses, the faculty can measure detailed mastery of objectives at the lower levels, and when teaching more advanced, higher division courses, one would be assessing students' abilities at the higher levels of Bloom’s taxonomy.
Learning objectives should be established in a pedagogical interaction so that both instructors and learners understand the real purpose behind them. Following are some of the reasons why Bloom’s Taxonomy is critical in an educational institute.
By using application and understanding levels, determine and comprehend the meaning of the phrases, words, and idioms used in the paragraph.
Using evaluation and analysis, conclude the passage and its points.
Getting information and retaining it through understanding and remembering.
Using the evaluation concept, the faculty can determine the tone of the author's voice.
Original Bloom’s Taxonomy Vs. Revised Bloom’s Taxonomy
The original Bloom’s taxonomy included levels of Knowledge, Comprehension, Application, Analysis, Synthesis, and Evaluation. Whereas the revised taxonomy changed into Remember, Understand, Apply, Analyze, Evaluate, and Create. The older version included both the noun aspect and the verb aspect but was unidimensional. The revised taxonomy renames the original skills to verbs, flips the top skills, and also subdivides each skill along a knowledge dimension.
The revised version is just an update to the original taxonomy that simply expanded on the vision of the original while revising the language and hierarchy of the popular cognitive process dimension. As per Krathwohl, the revision of this taxonomy was developed in much the same manner 45 years later. This is generally referred to as the "Revised Bloom’s taxonomy." The new draft also considered many of Bloom's own criticisms and concerns about his original taxonomy.
‘Creating’ which is the most vital level of the revised version, moves the student into a world of thinking whereby they begin to come up with new and unique innovations and ideas, even moving into the dimension of original thought.
Why Is Bloom's Taxonomy Important?
For more than 50 years and counting, faculty from K–12 through HEIs have used Bloom's taxonomy extensively. This is mostly because of its structure, which emphasizes setting realistic learning objectives that teachers and students can both comprehend and developing a well-thought-out strategy to achieve them.
In order to quickly assess what the students are capable of as a result of the training they have received at each level of Bloom's taxonomy without the need for class-wide generalizations, educators are increasingly urged to see learning objectives in behavioral terms. It further allows teachers to assess learning on an ongoing basis, promoting students' reflection on their academic progress.
In addition, it is important for different stakeholders.
To Students:
Bloom’s taxonomy helps students improve their brain strength and further help in creating more synapses between nerve cells.
It promotes higher-order thinking in the students by building up their lower-level cognitive skills.
It helps students develop skills that employers want, such as problem-solving skills, critical-thinking skills, etc.
To Faculty:
The taxonomy helps teachers determine the intellectual capability at which individual students can work and develop clear objectives in their framework.
It can assist in designing assessments by matching course learning objectives to any given level of mastery.
It further helps faculty improve their critical thinking.
To Institutions:
Bloom’s taxonomy helps in achieving better outcomes and monitoring & improving overall progress.
Additionally, creating a curriculum that meets the needs of the industry might be helpful for course creators.
How Bloom’s Taxonomy Is Useful For Teachers?
Bloom’s taxonomy helps the teachers to think and analyze their teaching and student’s learning. The framework is used to state clear objectives which can help the teachers to plan lessons accordingly. Moreover, it can provide a framework for cognitive behaviors which can be applied to understand the difficulty of tasks, conduct an assessment, and simplify or complicate the activities.
Bloom’s Taxonomy helps the teachers to understand the objectives of classroom teaching. It guides them to change the complexity of the questions and helps students to achieve higher levels of hierarchy. Further, it helps to develop critical thinking among teachers.