Chapter 9- Aims, Goals, Objectives

Aims of Education

• General statements that provide shape and direction

• Starting points that suggest an ideal or inspirational vision of the good

• Guides for the educational process

Sources of Aims

• Spencer’s Report• Cardinal Principles of Secondary Education• The Purpose of Education in American

Democracy• Education for All American Youth• The Central Purpose of American Education• A Nation at Risk

Goals of Education

• Statements of purpose with some outcome in mind

• Address certain characteristics of the learner who attains the goals

• Desired outcomes for students as a result of experiencing the curriculum

• Derived from various aims

Levels of Goals

• Aims become goals when they become more specific and refer to a particular school or school system and to a specific subject area of the curriculum

Formulating Goals

• Timelessness

• Address the needs of society, of students, or the particular community

Objectives

• More specific statements of the outcomes of the curriculum or project being considered

• Statements that enable curriculum decision makers to identify the particular intent of a particular action

• Philosophy Aims Goals Objectives

Types of Educational Objectives

• Program Objectives– Address subjects at particular grade levels

• Course Objectives– Relate to particular courses within grade levels

• Classroom Objectives– Divided into unit objectives and lesson plan

objectives

Conceptions of Objectives

• Taba– School-wide outcomes

– Unit, course or grade level program outcomes

• Ornstein– program objectives

– course objectives

– classroom objectives

• Posner and Rudnitsky– Intended Learning Outcomes

Behavioral Objectives

• precise statements of outcomes in terms of observable behavior expected of students after instruction

Nonbehavioral Objectives

• Examples: Appreciate, Know, Understand

Guidelines for Formulating Educational Objectives

• Matching

• Worth

• Wording

• Appropriateness

• Logical Grouping

• Periodic Revision

Taxonomic Levels

• Cognitive Domain

• Affective Domain

• Psychomotor Domain

Cognitive Domain

• Bloom’s Taxonomy– Knowledge

– Comprehension

– Application

– Analysis

– Synthesis

– Evaluation

Affective Domain

• Krathwohl’s Taxonomy– Receiving– Responding– Valuing– Organization– Characterization

Psychomotor Domain

• Harrow’s Taxonomy– Reflex Movements– Fundamental Movements– Perceptual Abilities– Physical Abilities– Skilled Movements– Nondiscursive Communication

Approaches to Educational Objectives

• Behaviorist

• Managerial

• Systems

• Humanistic

• Reconceptualist

Behavioral

• technical/scientific

• concern for specificity

• we can identify essential learnings

• compartmentalization of curriculum

• defined scope and sequence

• convergent emphasis on curricular learnings

Systems/Managerial

• Systems and organizational Theories

• Interrelatedness of the parts of the organization

• Objectives are part of the total process of decision making and curriculum implementation

• Management by objectives

• Curriculum as a system of related components

• Focus on the person

• Personal growth, joy of learning, respect for others

• Curriculum seen as divergent

• Opportunities for students to explore, to become self-directed

Humanistic

• Political and social posture with a theoretical critique

• Empower individual to be more fully human, socially sensitive, and existential

• Curriculum is emergent- concern with those processes that allow for control of one’s learning

Reconceptualists