How to Establish Learning Objectives for Your Course
The purpose of any course is to teach the student something. This could be anything from how to assemble an engine, to how to read and write in a foreign language. The goal of teaching the student is to help them learn what they need to know in order for them to achieve their desired outcome. Because of this, it’s important to invest the time and effort to clearly establish learning objectives for your course. There are two major types of objectives: cognitive and affective.
Cognitive objectives are based on what you want students to know or do, while affective objectives are based on what you want students to feel or do. When designing an instructional unit around your desired learning outcomes, it’s important to make sure that your objectives align with this type of instructional design. Here are some tips on how you can better create objectives for your courses!
Establish Learning Objectives Cognitive vs. affective
When planning your instructional unit, you should be thinking about whether you want students to know or do something. The most common way of distinguishing between these two types of objectives is by asking the question “What are the students’ goals?” If the goal is cognitive, then the instruction should focus on what students need to learn or remember. On the other hand, if affective objectives are desired, then instruction should focus on how students feel when they complete their tasks.
Cognitive objectives are based on what you want students to know or do. For example, if you’re teaching a cooking course, your objective might be for learners to gain an understanding of how certain types of vegetables affect the taste of food.
Affective objectives are focused on what you want the student to feel or do. If your instructional unit is about healthy eating, your objective could be for learners to practice making healthier choices in their daily lives.
The best way to create good learning objectives is by asking yourself what you want students to learn and then making it happen!
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Establish Cognitive Learning Objectives
Cognitive learning objectives are the goals that you want students to learn or know when they complete your course. They are based on what you want students to remember, understand, and do.
1. Ask yourself: “What is the desired outcome of this course?”
2. Define a specific goal that will be met by completion of the course
3. Define an action taken by students that will result in their achieving your goal
4. Determine what skills, knowledge, and abilities you want students to have upon completion of the course
Establish Affective Learning Objectives
To create affective learning objectives, you first have to decide what your desired outcome is. This is where a lot of students get stuck because they don’t know what their desired outcomes are.
To start, ask yourself: “What will be the overall feeling I want students to have after completing this course?”
This can include things like: more self-confidence, feeling fulfilled, wanting to share their opinions, etc.
Once you have decided on what your desired outcome is for the course, you’ll need to think about why that feeling exists and how it will help students gain some type of knowledge or skill from this course.
Lastly, make sure that your objectives align with the instructional design by ensuring they are specific, measurable and observable.
Where to start when designing your course
The way in which you design your course will have a major impact on the objectives you’ll create for it. This is because the type of instructional design you use will determine what types of learning outcomes you want students to achieve.
The two types of instructional design are affective and cognitive. The purpose of affective instruction is to help students change their emotions or feelings, while the purpose of cognitive instruction is to help students understand information.
When designing your course around these two different types of instructional design, it’s important that your objectives align with the goal of using affective instruction to create emotional change in your students and cognitive instruction to increase understanding.
An example of an affective objective could be: “Students should be able to understand how gender identity impacts one’s sense of self.” Here, the objective may encourage students to develop an understanding about how gender identity impacts self-worth and how society views gender identity. Another example could be: “Students should be able to identify their strengths as a leader.” In this case, students would learn what strengths they have as a leader and how they can best utilize those strengths in order to lead others effectively.
On the other hand, a cognitive objective might be: “Students should learn about leadership
1) Make sure your objectives match the instructional design.
Ex: If you want students to learn how to build a circuit, make sure the learning objectives align with the instructional design.
2) Make sure your objectives are relevant and individualized for each learner.
Ex: If you want students to learn how to improve their work/life balance, make sure your learning objectives are individualized for each learner.
3) Make sure that your teaching methods align with your objectives.
Ex: If you want students to learn how to improve their work/life balance, make sure they're using active learning techniques in order to engage with the material (i.e., hands-on activities, collaborative activities).
When designing an instructional unit around your desired learning outcomes, it’s important to make sure that your objectives align with this type of instructional design. Here are some tips on how you can better create objectives for your courses!
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