Table Of ContentDesigning
&
Assessing
Educational
Objectives
Robert J. Marzano
John S. Kendall
Designing
&
Assessing
Educational
Objectives
Applying the
NNeeww TTaaxxoonnoommyy
A Joint Publication
NATIONAL ASSOCIATION
or SECONDARY SCHOOL
NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF ELEMENTARY SCHOOL PRINCIPALS PRINCIPALS
Serving All Elementary and Middle Level Principals
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Marzano, Robert J.
Designing and assessing educational objectives : applying the new taxonomy/by Robert J. Marzano
and John S. Kendall.
p. cm.
Ajoint publication with the American Association of School Administrators, the National
Association of Elementary School Principals, and the National Association of Secondary School
Principals.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-4129-4034-4 (cloth)
ISBN 978-1-4129-4035-1 (pbk.)
1. Education—Aims and objectives—Evaluation. I. Kendall, John S. II. Title.
LB17.M393 2008
370.11—dc22 2007050194
This book is printed on acid-free paper.
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Contents
About the Authors vii
1. A New Perspective on Educational Objectives 1
2. The New Taxonomy in Brief 9
3. Retrieval Objectives and Tasks 25
4. Comprehension Objectives and Tasks 43
5. Analysis Objectives and Tasks 55
6. Knowledge Utilization Objectives and Tasks 93
7. Metacognition Objectives and Tasks 117
8. Self-System Objectives and Tasks 143
9. The New Taxonomy as a Scale for Student Performance 167
Afterword 179
References 180
Index 181
About the Authors
Dr. Robert J. Marzano is President and founder of
Marzano & Associates in Centennial, Colorado, Senior
Scholar at Mid-continent Research for Education and
Learning (McREL) in Aurora, Colorado, and Associate
Professor at Cardinal Stritch University in Milwaukee,
Wisconsin. He is the author of 30 books, 150 articles and
chapters in books, and 100 sets of curriculum materials for
teachers and students in Grades K–12. His works include
The New Taxonomy of Educational Objectives, What Works in Schools:
Translating Research Into Action, School Leadership That Works, Building
Background Knowledge for Academic Achievement,Classroom Management That
Works, Classroom Instruction That Works, Classroom Assessment and Grading
That Work, andThe Art and Science of Teaching.
During his forty years in public education, Marzano has worked multiple
times in every state as well as in a host of countries in Europe and Asia. The
central theme in his work has been translating research and theory into practical
programs and tools for K–12 teachers and administrators.
John S. Kendall is a Senior Director in research at
McREL. There he directs a technical assistance unit
that develops and provides standards-related services
for schools, districts, states, and other organizations.
Clients have included Achieve, Inc., The College Board,
and NASA’s Jet Propulsion Lab. He has been with McREL
seventeen years as Research Assistant, Program Associate,
and Senior Director.
An internationally recognized expert in the development and improvement of
standards for education, Kendall has consulted for more than fifty school districts
and fourteen state departments of education as well as education agencies in the
U.S. territories and abroad. Senior author of Content Knowledge:A Compendium
vii
viii Designing and Assessing Educational Objectives
of Standards and Benchmarks for K–12 Education,he has authored or coauthored
six books and more than thirty monographs, technical studies, and articles. He
received his undergraduate and master’sdegrees from the University of Colorado
at Boulder.
Kendall’s current research and technical assistance efforts include working with
clients to establish performance standards for the classroom, developing standards
for principals, and identifying the knowledge and skills that help students learn.
C O
HAPTER NE
A New Perspective on
Educational Objectives
T
his handbook is a guide to the design and assessment of educational objec-
tives. It is a practical application of The New Taxonomy of Educational
Objectives (Marzano & Kendall, 2007). While the New Taxonomy has a number
of potential uses, here we focus on designing and assessing educational objectives.
As indicated by its title, The New Taxonomy is designed as a replacement for
Bloom et al.’s taxonomy, published in 1956 (Bloom, Englehart, Furst, Hill, &
Krathwohl, 1956) Although that work was powerful and enduring, it had some
flaws and inconsistencies that can now be reconciled, given the sixty-plus years of
research and theory since its publication (for a detailed discussion, see Marzano &
Kendall, 2007).
Bloom’s taxonomy made a major contribution to the science of designing edu-
cational objectives. Indeed, prior to its publication, there was not much agreement
as to the nature of objectives. Bloom adopted Ralph Tyler’s (Airasian, 1994)
notion that an educational objective should contain a clear reference to a specific
type of knowledge as well as the behaviors that would signal understanding or
skill related to that knowledge.
Like Bloom’s taxonomy and others based on it (e.g., Anderson et al., 2001),
the New Taxonomy has a specific syntax for educational objectives. We use the
following stem for all objectives: The student (or students) will be able to...plus
a verb phrase and an object. The verb phrase states the mental process that is to be
employed while completing the objective, and the object is the knowledge that is
the focus of the objective.
The New Taxonomy can be represented as depicted in Figure 1.1. The rows
on the left-hand side of Figure 1.1 represent three systems of thought and in
the case of the cognitive system, four subcomponents of that system. The columns
on the right-hand side of Figure 1.1 depict three different types or domains of
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