Understanding in Learning: Writing Objectives for Deep Comprehension

1. How do we know “understanding” when we see it? and how can we write objectives for learning that focus on understanding? The famous educational philosopher John Dewey once visited a science classroom in Chicago and asked the students “What would you find if you dug a hole in the earth?” Getting no response, he repeated the question; again he received nothing but silence. The teacher scolded Mr. Dewey, “You’re asking the wrong question.” Turning to the class she asked, “What is the state of the center of the earth?” The class replied in unison “igneous fusion.”

2. Consider… • What can an expert do or tell you about if they deeply understand • evolution? • changes in states of matter? • plate tectonics?

3. Let’s talk about knowledge before we talk about understanding… • Knowledge usually means that a person can identify some fact or collection of facts. • Students could name parts of a plant • Students could state the formula for Boyle’s Gas Law. • At the level of knowledge, students can only be said to be familiar with an idea-- enough to get them by at a cocktail party. • Verbs that usually indicate that knowledge is required: name, list, label, define, state, identify.

4. Knowledge is nice, but what do you do with it? Understanding is the ability to think and act flexibly with what one knows. It is a performance capacity as opposed to rote recall or plugging in answers (Wiggins and McTighe, 1998).

5. Four ways to think about understanding • Explanation • Interpretation • Application • Perspective

6. Facet I:Explanation • sophisticated and justified accounts of events, actions, and ideas • Why is that so? • What explains such events? • How can we prove it? • To what is this connected? • How does this work? • What is implied?

7. Examples • A student can explain why ice, water and steam are all the same chemical substance. • A student explains how the phases of the moon occur. • A student proves his theory of how pulleys work by constructing a set of them that will reduce his effort to lift 20 pounds by half.

8. Facet II: Interpretation • Interpretations and translations that provide meaning. • What does it (a graph, a theory, a scientific argument) mean? • Why does it matter? • What does it illustrate or illuminate? • How does it relate to me?

9. Examples • A student can interpret the meaning behind a graph of predator and prey relationships. • A student can understand the arguments of and offer rebuttals to a classmate who believes that light can go around corners.

10. Facet III: Application • The ability to use knowledge effectively in new situations and diverse contexts. • How and where can we use this knowledge, skill, or process? • How should my thinking and action be modified to meet the demands of this particular situation?

11. Examples • A student can diagnose what is wrong with his classmate’s plant growth experiment and offer suggestions for improvement. • A student can use their knowledge of plate tectonics on earth and predict what might be happening in the interior of other planets. • A student recognizes when a science problem about gears requires the use of proportional reasoning that they learned about in math class.

12. Facet IV: Perspective An important symptom of an emerging understanding is the capacity to represent a problem in a number of different ways and to approach its solution from varied vantage points; a single rigid representation is unlikely to suffice (Gardner, 1991). • Critical and insightful points of view.

13. From whose point of view? • From which vantage point? • What is assumed or tacit that needs to be made explicit? • What is justified or warranted? • Is there adequate evidence? • What are the strengths and weaknesses of the idea?

14. Examples • A student can not only explain, but critique her own beliefs about evolution as an explanation for diversity on earth. • A student can articulate why certain interpretations of scientific studies might be exaggerated or misinterpreted by the business world. • A student reads a local newspaper article on sewage treatment and can identify the underlying assumptions the author is making.

15. Goals and objectives in science teaching--why so important? • They guide all instructional decisions--they are the reason that you will teach the way you do. • Without them you cannot assess student progress.

16. Some good examples at level of understanding: • Students will interpret data on the motion of pendulums to determine what variables influence it’s motion. • Students will describe how subduction is related to volcanic activity. • Students will critique the predictive value of the model of inheritance based on Mendelian genetics .

17. Some good examples at level of knowledge: • Students will know that scientific models are subject to change over time. • Students will know that exothermic chemical reactions release energy. • Students will know that mutation is one mechanism that allows natural selection to continue.

18. 10 guidelines about how to write objectives 1. Objectives should be intellectual accomplishments by the students, it is not an objective for students to: • Discuss • Examine • Read • Talk about • Consider • Build <---These are not ends in themselves, rather, it is through discussion or examination that learning objectives of real worth are accomplished.

19. Continued... 2. Objectives are things the students will understand or do, not what the teacher will do. 3. Objectives should be written in terms simple enough so that students and parents can understand them. 4. Coordinate objectives with the EALR’s when possible.

20. Continued… 5. Some objectives must necessarily target knowledge nuggets (“students will know that...”) and basic skills, but the most important ones target understanding. 6. Typically you will have two to four objectives for most class periods. 7. It is possible to have the same objectives over several class periods. 8. Objectives should not overlap with one another and do not combine two objectives into one statement.

21. Continued... 9. All objectives should be assessable by some means. 10. Objectives, not activity-mania, should drive how you assess and how you teach. Objectives Assessment Learning Activities

22. Other types of objectives • In addition to intellectual objectives, you can and should have objectives for • productive social interaction in the science classroom (listening to group members, sharing equipment with others, respect for others) • safety (knowing what to do in case of a chemical spill, how to use safety equipment) • Values such as stewardship of natural resources, or appreciation of multiple points of view in controversial science issues.

23. Your verb stash, use these to write your objectives… • Interpret • Apply • Analyze • Critique • Identify assumptions • Diagnose • Provide evidence • Theorize • Reorganize • Explain how • Justify • Generalize • Predict • Support • Verify • Prove • Substantiate • Infer • Illustrate • Modify • Synthesize

24. List of do nots... • Students will: • Discuss • Maintain a journal • Work collaboratively • Research ideas for libraries • Gain experience with group work • Work in groups to gather data • Address the question • Explore the idea • These “objectives” are not specific!