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Bloom's Taxonomy

Guide of assessment activities

This part of the document provides a guide for developing assessment activities based on the key active verbs in the Australian Curriculum: Digital Technologies using Bloom's Taxonomy as a framework.

Expanding on the work by Carnegie Mellon University, we have incorporated the key active verbs from the Australian Curriculum and have tailored sample assessment activities relevant to the Digital Technologies subject area. This table is based on Bloom's Revised Taxonomy (Anderson, Krathwohl & Bloom, 2001).

Definition

Retrive relevant knowledge from long-term memory (Anderson & Krathwwohl, 2001).

Recognising, Recalling.

Key Active Verbs as used in Achievement Standards

  • List: A series of items that are related or recorded for a particular purpose (ACARA).
  • Recognise: To be aware of or acknowledge and make connections (ACARA).
  • Identify: Establish or indicate who or what someone or something is (ACARA).

Sample assessment activities

Objective tests or assessment activities that require students to recall or recognise information.

  • Fill-in-the-blank.
  • Multiple-choice items.
  • Labelling diagrams or images.
  • Reciting.
  • English text production: Recount, procedural recount, explanation.

Sample assessment indicators

  • Accuracy scores – This involves identifying correct vs errors, or identifying all correct elements in oral, text/visual presentation.
  • Item analysis – Examining to see across the class if there are items that had higher error rates in which misconceptions or knowledge needs to be addressed in future lessons.
  • Item analysis - How many different items in assessment work can students recall/recognise? Looking for the level of complexity and number of items.

Definition

Construct meaning from instructional messages, including oral, written and graphic communication (Anderson & Krathwwohl, 2001).

Interpreting, Exemplifying, Classifying, Summarising, Inferring, Comparing, Explaining.

Key Active Verbs as used in Achievement Standards

  • Describe: Give an account of characteristics or features (ACARA).
  • Explain: Make (an idea or situation) clear to someone by describing it in more detail or revealing relevant facts (ACARA).
  • Distinguish: Recognise point/s of difference (ACARA).

Sample assessment activities

Opportunities where students can share their understanding of a topic through oral, visual or written communication.

  • Demonstrations.
  • Oral/written open test questions.
  • Concept maps.
  • Oral presentations.
  • Whole-class or small group focused discussion on Digital Technologies knowledge topics.
  • English text production: Explanation, discussion.

Sample assessment indicators

  • Performance rubrics that identify critical components of the required work that includes varying levels of proficiency across the components. Rubrics can be constructed by the teacher, students or in partnership.
  • Peer evaluation (supported through rubrics or a criteria).
  • Self-evaluation (supported through rubrics or a criteria)
  • Think-aloud interviews – Involves interviewing students alongside their work. Teachers elicit information, looking for the depth and breadth of knowledge behind their creation, coverage of content and concepts, use of discipline language and reasoning for using certain techniques or solutions.

Definition

Carry out or use a procedure in a given situation (Anderson & Krathwwohl, 2001).

Executing, Implementing.

Key Active Verbs as used in Achievement Standards

  • Represent: Use words, images, symbols or signs to convey meaning (ACARA).
  • Use: Take, hold, or deploy (something) as a means of accomplishing or achieving something; employ (Oxford University Press).
  • Design: Plan and evaluate the construction of a product or process (ACARA).
  • Incorporate: Take in or contain (something) as part of a whole; include (Oxford University Press).
  • Manipulate: To adapt or change (ACARA).
  • Define: State or describe exactly the nature, scope, or meaning of (an object), and/or mark out the boundaries or limits (Oxford University Press).

Sample assessment activities

Activities that require students to use procedures to solve or complete familiar or unfamiliar tasks. This might also require students to determine which procedure is most appropriate for the task at hand.

  • Test/quiz questions
  • Demonstrations (e.g. using a robot, or sorting data into order).
  • Performances or presentations.
  • Prototyping digital solutions.
  • Programming or Computational Thinking activities (plugged and unplugged activities).
  • Problem-based learning activities in which a process or procedure is required to solve the problem.
  • Design and planning documents (flow charts, design plans, pseudo code, symbols, storyboard).
  • Posters (displaying information).
  • English text production: Procedure or procedural recount.

Sample assessment indicators

  • Accuracy scores – measuring correct vs incorrect or attempts at applying knowledge and areas for improvement.
  • Checklist– that identify criteria for success or skills to be demonstrated, that are checked-off.
  • Rubrics – A descriptive scoring or marking scheme developed by teachers (or students and teachers) to guide judgements about the products or processes of students' learning, presented as a matrix of levels of achievement or performance for a set of criteria.
  • Primary Trait Analysis – (Benander et al 2000), in which a scoring rubric is used to explicitly breakdown the content criteria for assessment. Each section is given a mark, with the final grade representing a total mark for all sections. Typically used in senior years for text production and project work.

Definition

Break material into constituent parts and determine how parts relate to one another and to an overall structure or purpose (Anderson & Krathwwohl, 2001).

Differentiating, Organising, Attributing.

Key Active Verbs as used in Achievement Standards

  • Sequence: To arrange in order (ACARA).
  • Collect: Bring or gather together (a number of things) (Oxford University Press).
  • Test: A procedure intended to establish the quality, performance, or reliability of something, especially before it is taken into widespread use (Oxford University Press).
  • Distinguish: Recognise point/s of difference (ACARA).

Sample assessment activities

Activities that require students to discriminate or select relevant from irrelevant parts, determine how elements function together, or differentiate bias, values or underlying intent in presented materials.

  • Debates.
  • Selection task, in which students are provided information and are asked to select which bits of information are most important or which process is most useful.
  • Concept maps (systems thinking).
  • Portfolio (collection of design works and artefact).
  • Digital capture (Photo/video) of physical activities.
  • English text production: Discussion, exposition, reviews.

Sample assessment indicators

  • External “client” evaluations, e.g. community business, industry, other class (to pitch project to) who provide feedback on the extent that solutions align with their needs, the design brief or a set of criteria.
  • Rubrics – A descriptive scoring or marking scheme developed by teachers (or students and teachers) to guide judgements about the products or processes of students' learning, presented as a matrix of levels of achievement or performance for a set of criteria.
  • Primary Trait Analysis (Benander et al 2000)– in which a scoring rubric is used to explicitly breakdown the content criteria for assessment. Each section is given a mark, with the final grade representing a total mark for all sections. Typically used in senior years for text production and project work.

Definition

Make judgements based on a criteria and standards (Anderson & Krathwwohl, 2001).

Checking, Critiquing.

Key Active Verbs as used in Achievement Standards

  • Evaluate: Examine and judge the merit or significance of something (e.g. in Math, calculate; In DT, “trace”, “execute”) (ACARA).
  • Take account: To take into consideration (Oxford University Press).

Sample assessment activities

A range of activities that require students to test, monitor, judge or critique readings, performances, or products against an established criteria or standards.

  • Journals/diaries, documenting testing of own or other's’ work.
  • Test/quiz questions.
  • English text production: Discussion, exposition, reviews.
  • Programming “tracing” activities, in which students read the code and determine the output.

Sample assessment indicators

  • Rubrics – A descriptive scoring or marking scheme developed by teachers (or students and teachers) to guide judgements about the products or processes of students' learning, presented as a matrix of levels of achievement or performance for a set of criteria. In evaluation, used to assess the depth of analysis that students have demonstrated in their work.
  • Self- or peer-assessment, supported through Primary Trait Analysis (Benander et al 2000), in which a scoring rubric is used to explicitly breakdown the content criteria for assessment. Each section is given a mark, with the final grade representing a total mark for all sections. Typically used in senior years for text production and project work. A scoring rubric could support self or peer evaluation.
  • Checklists for signaling when students have demonstrated a skill, evaluating a design or implementation of a Digital Technologies project.

Definition

Put elements together to form a coherent or functional whole; recognise elements into a new pattern or structure (Anderson & Krathwwohl, 2001).

Generating, Planning, Producing.

Key Active Verbs as used in Achievement Standards

  • Share: Post or repost (something) on a social media website or application; Tell someone about something (Oxford University Press).
  • Implement: Put (a decision, plan, agreement, etc.) into effect (Oxford University Press).
  • Manage: Be in charge of/run (a project) (Oxford University Press).
  • Collaborate: Work jointly on an activity or project (Oxford University Press).
  • Create: Bring (something) into existence (Oxford University Press).
  • Model: A simplified description, especially a mathematical one, of a system or process, to assist calculations and predictions (Oxford University Press).

Sample assessment activities

Opportunities for students to apply their knowledge and skills (or a context for acquiring new knowledge and skills) where they are to design and construct a solution or artefact to demonstrate learning.

  • Research project portfolios.
  • Performances.
  • Design and planning documents (flow charts, design plans, pseudo code, symbols, storyboard).
  • Digital artefact (of Maker project, App, Game, Programming Creation)
  • Prototyping digital solutions.
  • English text production: Explanation, procedure or procedural recount.

Sample assessment indicators

  • Rubrics – A descriptive scoring or marking scheme developed by teachers (or students and teachers) to guide judgements about the products or processes of students' learning, presented as a matrix of levels of achievement or performance for a set of criteria.
  • External “client” evaluations, e.g. community business, industry, other class (to pitch project to) who provide feedback on the extent that solutions align with their needs, the design brief or a set of criteria.
  • Primary Trait Analysis (Benander et al 2000) – in which a scoring rubric is used to explicitly breakdown the content criteria for assessment. Each section is given a mark, with the final grade representing a total mark for all sections. Typically used in senior years for text production and project work.
  • Think-aloud interviews – Involves interviewing students alongside their work. Teachers elicit information, looking for the depth and breadth of knowledge behind their creation, coverage of content and concepts, use of discipline language and reasoning for using certain techniques or solutions.