Monday, September 1, 2014

Learning Objectives in Hybrid & Blended Learning Scenarios (Part 2)


Learning Objectives in Hybrid
& Blended Learning Scenarios (Part 2)

By Prof. Jonathan Acuña Solano
Monday, September 1, 2014
Twitter: @jonacuso
Post 139

Learning objectives are essential for guiding instructional activities whether we have F2F courses or we are teaching in a VLE scenario. Without clear learning objectives, a course’s activities may not directly relate to its intended teaching goals and desired learning outcomes. For this very reason, the creation of measurable learning objectives based on one’s Needs Assessment, with a Bloom’s Taxonomy backup (see Iowa State University, 2014), is key in attaining real student learning through an instructional activity.

The following is a designing exercise to get to really know how the ADDIE process works and its implications while planning (see Martin, M., n.d.).

Click on the picture to amplify it.

      With this sample activity –actually carried out in a Material Design class, in which students come to class for theoretical instruction and then work online on their own-, we can visualize the organization of the teacher’s instructional delivery to achieve the desired learning outcome and guarantee that all them can continue to repeat the very same behavior in their professional teaching practice.

As seen in the chart, the instructor has all the information to achieve the learning goal with all the correct assessment. As pointed out, ELT students will create a reading activity based on the structure most of these exercises have. With 90% accuracy, the learning objective needs to be accomplished since it is no good to have faulty reading tasks for EFL students. The condition to achieve this objective, which is not stated in the learning goal, is included in the instructional content that needs to be covered. The instructional strategies and resources carefully chosen over here need to complement the full accomplishment of what the instructor needs learners to develop in terms of competencies to successfully design their own EFL reading exercises for their current or future students.

The most important challenge that can be spotted in reaching the plan’s goal is to find all that is needed by learners to 1. understand what they need to do, 2. clearly identify how they are going to do it, and 3. visualize how the instructor is going to help them through the process. For sure, mitigating all sub-challenges is crucial, and that can be done by including a video or a series of videos to guide learners and to let them know of the online office hours where they can reach the instructor.



Clark, D. (2014, July 7). Bloom’s Taxonomy of Learning Domains. Retrieved on 2014, August 31 from the Big Dog & Little Dog’s Performance Juxtaposition webpage at http://www.nwlink.com/~donclark/hrd/bloom.html

Iowa State University. (2014). A Model of Learning Objectives. Retrieved on 2014, August 31 from Iowa State University: Center for Excellence in Learning and Teaching webpage at http://www.celt.iastate.edu/teaching-resources/effective-practice/revised-blooms-taxonomy/

Laureate Education. (2013). Learning Objectives in Hybrid & Blended Learning Scenarios. Retrieved on 2014, April 5 from http://global.laureate.net/portal.aspx#!home/faculty

Martin, M. (n.d.). ADDIE, The Instructional Design Process. Retrieved on 2014, August 31, from Michele Martin’s Type Pad webpage at http://michelemartin.typepad.com/ADDIE.pdf



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