Course Objec­tives

Course objec­tives answers the “why.” It tells us why the stu­dents are tak­ing the class; it spec­i­fied the out­comes the train­ing is sup­posed to achieve. A good les­son plan will have a gen­eral goal, main goal or metagoal. This is the big pic­ture, and then it will break the big goal into smaller parts.

Long Term Goals

The ABCD method of writ­ing Objectives

Instruc­tional Design­ers can spend a good por­tion of the edu­ca­tion learn­ing how to write effec­tive objec­tives. Here is a quick guide on how to best cre­ate the spe­cific objec­tives of a les­son. It uses some­thing known as the ABCD method.

Audi­ence: This is why it is impor­tant to have an idea of the com­po­si­tion of the class. As a trainer you should be able to tai­lor the objec­tives to best reflect the audi­ences’ needs.

Behav­ior: Objec­tives must be observ­able. The trainer must be able to see the stu­dent per­form an objective.

Which of these two objec­tives are wrong?

1. The stu­dent will be able to appre­ci­ate an exam­ple of a post-modernistic paint­ing upon their visit to the National Museum of Art.
2. The stu­dent will list all the states that make up the United States of America.

How do we observe appre­ci­a­tion? Appre­ci­a­tion is a non-observable action. The actions that result from appre­ci­a­tion are observ­able, so we would need to list those actions. On Feb­ru­ary 14^th it is impor­tant to show appre­ci­a­tion for our sig­nif­i­cant other. We SHOW appre­ci­a­tion by order­ing flow­ers, buy­ing choco­lates, tak­ing her/him to din­ner, buy­ing them a present.

• Order­ing flow­ers (observable)
• Buy­ing choco­lates (observable)
• Tak­ing some­one out to eat (observable)
• Buy­ing a present and order­ing flow­ers (observable)
• Appre­ci­at­ing some­one (implied by these other actions)

Condi­tion: Under what cir­cum­stance will the objec­tive be com­pleted? What are the stu­dents given, what envi­ron­ment will they find them­selves. For exam­ple: Given the proper ingre­di­ents and a recipe the stu­dent will be able to cre­ate choco­late chip cook­ies. It can also state items not pro­vided. For exam­ple: With­out any ref­er­ences the stu­dent will be able to write the pre­am­ble to the U.S. Constitution.

Degree: Some­thing miss­ing so far in all the objec­tives is the qual­i­fiers for suc­cess. In one of the above exam­ples, writ­ing out the pre­am­ble, how do we know the stu­dent has com­pleted the objec­tive suc­cess­fully. The degree is how we quan­tify the suc­cess of the learn­ing. It is also how we can develop assess­ment. With all of this infor­ma­tion we can write a com­plete objec­tive: Stu­dent will be able to state from mem­ory all 12 facial bones.

The Learn­ing Pyramid:

The Learn­ing Pyra­mid is the idea that lessons should be designed with objec­tives that are in three cat­e­gories: all stu­dents will learn, most stu­dents will learn, and some stu­dents will learn (Lynch & Warner, 2008). The “all stu­dents” objec­tives are the min­i­mum required for pass­ing the train­ing, the most is the mid­dle ground. This is where most of your stu­dents will fall. The some cat­e­gories are help­ful when learn­ers are present who either have advanced skill in the topic or have a knack for it.

Items for the les­son plan:

• The metaob­jec­tive
• Indi­vid­ual les­son objectives

 Other Resources:

• How to write pro­gram objectives/outcomes (pdf)
• How to Write Learn­ing Objec­tives that Meet Demand­ing Behav­ioral Criteria
• How to write stu­dent learn­ing outcomes