Post 286: Teaching Components of a good Lesson Objective and the Cognitive Learning Model

Post 286: Teaching Components of a good Lesson Objective and the Cognitive Learning Model

Elements of a Good Teaching Lesson

Presentation--where the teacher introduces new knowledge through readings, class lesson, videos, or audio clips and/or Powerpoint presentations.  When a teacher first presents the lesson/concept, students have to learn new vocabulary, master new ways of thinking and understand the topic. This level of learning is known in Bloom's Taxonomy as the lowest level of cognitive skills to be understanding/knowledge where students are memorizing, reading and mastering material for the first time. When students are first exposed to the material, the most traditional way to assess how much a student has memorized/learned the material, is through online quizzes/tests/midterm or for students to write a Definition paper/expository essay.

Activities--Activities reinforce ideas students have mastered at the Presentation/Understanding/Knowledge level of Bloom's Taxonomy. The activities need to align with the class and lesson objective.  For instance, if you are teaching a unit on how to write a thesis statement, then your class lecture will be on how to write a thesis statement, then your forum discussion will be on how to write a thesis statement. Other activities include problem solving scenarios, role play, projects, and papers so students start to apply what they learn to their lives. This is equal to the Analysis, Application stage of the Bloom's Taxonomy which is a medium cognitive level of thinking.

Assessment and Feedback--Teachers need to find authentic methods of assessment to find out how much students have encoded, synthesized and applied what they have learned to the real world. Students can reflect or evaluate what they have learned in the class and be asked how they personally will apply the core concepts of the class to their lives. When students reflect on what they have learned, they are engaging in the highest level of cognitive thinking. As long as your class design prompts students to do higher order thinking, then you have a cognitively sound class lesson design. The presentation stage represents concrete thinking (lowest), then the middle part of your class involves getting students involved in activities to reinforce (application) what they have learned and finally, in the assessment/feedback stage, students reflect (synthesis) and apply what they have learned to their lives.