Throughout the duration of my secondary education, I predominately experienced Bloom's Taxonomy on the lower end of the spectrum. Most often, I experienced Remembering, Understanding, and Applying during high school and even in the beginning of my undergraduate education. I remember constantly memorizing vocabulary terms and dates for history tests, rehearsing lines of Shakespeare plays for British literature, and memorizing math formulas for pre-calculus class. It was in math classes that I believe I experienced the highest use of the application category because I remember always memorizing formulas and then actually putting them to use while solving problems. Not all of my classes were like that. Much of the information I learned was purely through memorization, and then I most likely forgot what was taught to me after the test. Post-secondary education definitely utilizes higher levels of Bloom's taxonomy through incorporation projects, presentations, and in-depth research and opinion papers into the curriculum to challenge one's thinking.
I believe that the reason why I experienced the basic levels of Bloom's taxonomy in secondary schooling is because that is the time where I was learning the basics. Everything was more generalized in terms of subjects and topics in high school. For the most part, everyone learned the same information and were given a basic foundation for learning. In post-secondary education, students choose their majors and have a more specific course of study. Their learning, therefore, becomes more in-depth and focused on the mastery of one subject area. This is where the application of the higher levels of Bloom's taxonomy come into play and students are able to really hone their skills.
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I like your point about high school being more generalized and that is why it utilizes more basic levels of Bloom's. Then when students go on to college or specialize in a specific field, their goal or career is in sight. At this stage they are more specific in what they need to learn and therefore it is taught at the higher levels to prepare them.
ReplyDeleteI agree that high school was more memorization and cramming for tests. I trully feel that if I had taken the same test a week later, I would have never passed. Talk about short term memory!! High school for me was definitely more of Bloom's lower level thinking, Remembering and understanding. I can not remember honestly analyzing or creating any projects. Everything was tests! College was more analyzing and creating projects, more higher order levels.
ReplyDeleteI agree that in high school it was more memorizing things for test, and that people would cram at the last minute just to know the information for the test. I think in post secondary studying moved more from memorization to understanding.
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