On Jan. 18 from 1-4 p.m., join the EDC and the Office of the Vice-Provost and Associate Vice-President (Academic) for the chance to reflect on the relationship between your course and the broader learning goals of your specific department and discipline. Through problem-focused instruction and hands-on activities, you will learn how to design courses that more effectively serve your department’s programs and students.

Learning outcomes should direct your course, but they also guide students – they are written from the students’ perspective and include action verbs. They tell students what the course priorities are and that they are responsible for actively pursuing these priorities.

Join us on Jan. 17 from 1-4 p.m. for a workshop that will provide you with the tools for developing clear and measurable learning outcomes.

At the end of this session, you will be able to:

• Explain the relationship between learning outcomes and course design
• Choose questions/criteria to consider when determining learning outcomes
• Apply Bloom’s Taxonomy of educational objectives to write learning outcomes
• Evaluate learning outcomes for clarity, demonstrability and appropriateness

This session is intended for all participants who are involved in designing learning experiences, in any delivery format.

Join us at the EDC on July 19 from 1-3:30 pm. to reflect on the relationship between your course and the broader learning goals of your specific department and discipline. Through problem-focused instruction and hands-on activities, you will learn how to design courses that more effectively serve your department’s programs and students.

This session will be jointly hosted by representatives from the EDC and the Office of the Vice-Provost and Associate Vice-President (Academic).

Join us at the EDC on July 13 from 9 a.m. – noon for a workshop that will provide you with the tools to develop clear and measurable learning outcomes. At the end of this session, you will be able to:

• Explain the relationship between learning outcomes and course design
• Choose questions/criteria to consider when determining learning outcomes
• Apply Bloom’s Taxonomy of educational objectives to write learning outcomes
• Evaluate learning outcomes for clarity, demonstrability and appropriateness

At the end of this workshop, you will be able to:

• Explain the relationship between learning outcomes and course design
• Choose questions/criteria to consider when determining learning outcomes
• Apply Bloom’s Taxonomy of educational objectives to write learning outcomes
• Evaluate learning outcomes for clarity, demonstrability and appropriateness

Learn more and register here.

Many of you are already familiar with the concept of . Perhaps you already include these statements of expected skills and competencies students will demonstrate by the end of the course on each course syllabus. But what about the degree or diploma, as a whole? Wouldn’t it also be helpful to make clear our expectations for graduates of each program?

Program-level learning outcomes assume that student learning is more than just the sum all courses taken. Developing program-level learning outcomes requires a holistic approach to understanding and articulating student learning – an approach in which all pathways to the completion of the degree or diploma are considered.

Looking at learning outcomes from the program perspective can provide faculty with clearer sense of the program’s goals and expectations. Establishing program learning outcomes can ensure there is coherence to the program and a better sense of the contribution individual program requirements make. Program learning outcomes also benefit students by communicating to them what they will gain from the program. They provide a rationale for the program structure, which includes the core as well as the other program requirements (e.g. breath, experiential learning requirements). In addition, they can assist students in understanding course components e.g. group work, oral presentations, or various forms of written assignments.

The assessment of program-level learning outcomes can provide rich data about your program, including answers to the following questions:

• Are students able to communicate clearly, in a style appropriate for their discipline? Are they given enough opportunities to practice and develop their written and oral communication skills?
• Does the program structure allow to student to gain sufficient breadth in important subject areas?
• How are students taught to think critically? When and how is critical thinking applied?
• Are there subsets of students who are achieving program learning outcomes to a greater to lesser degree than others?

The ultimate goal of any learning outcomes assessment process is continual program improvement. The evidence gathered through your assessments can be used to guide program changes and the allocation of resources in a more informed and purposeful way.

To find out more about program-level learning outcomes assessment, , or check out our .

Backward Design is an approach to curriculum planning that starts with final learning outcomes, and works backwards to determine activities and assessment tools. A Backward Design approach has the benefit of methodologically ensuring that the objectives and the assignments/activities are in synch. This approach shifts the focus from “input” to “output“ (Wiggins and McTighe 6). Output is defined as “what the student should be able to know, do, and understand upon leaving, expressed in performance and product terms” (Wiggins and McTighe 6).

Backward Design lesson planning usually begins with a hook, or some way to engage students. Ken Bain writes in What the Best College Teachers Do, that “To gain students’ attention, the best teachers start with something that . . . students care about, know, or think they know, rather than just lay out a blueprint or an outline or tale or theory or account of our own” (110).  Bain argues that this “requires students to begin struggling with an issue from their own perspective even before they know much about it“(110).

A Backward Design approach helps to answer questions outlined by Wiggins and McTighe in Understanding By Design. These questions include: “Why are we asking students to read this particular novel – in other words, what learnings will we seek from their having read it” (15)? “What kind of intellectual scaffolding is provided to guide students through the important ideas? How are students expected to use those ideas to make meaning of the many facts? What performance goals would help students know how to take notes for maximal effective use by course’s end” (21)?

In teaching writing, an example of an “output” or learning outcome is: students are able to identify strong and weak thesis statements. John Bean, in Engaging Ideas, outlines some teaching strategies that can meet this learning outcome: 1) “Present a Proposition (Thesis) for Students to Defend or Refute” (107). In this strategy the teacher develops arguable positions that the students debate in class. 2) “Give Students a Problem or Question That Demands the Student’s ‘Best Solution’ Answer’ “ (107). In this approach the instructor “provides a controversial thesis to defend or attack, and invites a variety of thesis statements arguing different conceptual positions” (108).  3) “Create ‘Strong Response’ Assignments Based on One or More Scholarly Articles or Other Readings” (109). In this strategy the students read articles and write a rebuttal to the arguments, speaking back to the text.  Assessment tools that follow from this approach will identify whether students have integrated new knowledge about strong and weak thesis statements.

There is an initial investment of time to design lessons and units beginning with the learning outcome. Wiggins and McTighe argue that it is worth the effort and will result in increased productivity over the long term (21).  This approach will increase student understanding and ability to apply learning in new contexts (7). Student engagement will be high when the purpose of learning is clear, and the outcomes are tied to activities and lecture topics.

Resources

Wiggins and McTighe offer a detailed template for unit planning in the book Understanding by Design Professional Development Workbook.

Works Cited

• Bean, John C. Engaging Ideas: The Professors Guide to Integrating Writing, Critical Thinking, and Active Learning in the Classroom. San Fransisco: Jossey-Bass, 2008. Print.
• Bain, Ken. What the Best College Teachers Do. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2004. Print.
• Wiggins, Grant, and Jay McTighe. Understanding By Design. Alexandria: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development (ASCD), 2005. Print.
• Wiggins, Grant, and Jay McTighe. Understanding By Design Professional Development Workbook. Alexandria: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development (ASCD), 2004. Print.