Bloom 2.0 – What should we use to cap it?

Yup, it seems that I’m blogging on the weekend – if not because I don’t seem to have the time through the week for the last little while and, well things have been a little nuts. So having said that I found two articles over the last week that I think are really pointing toward a way of new thinking concerning the fundamentals of how to structure the scope and sequence of instruction for not only k-12, but likely higher ed as well.

First, Wes pulled this out on “Bloom’s 2.0” and then Stephen dug this out on pedagogy defining “School 2.0“. So for reference, this is the original Bloom’s.

The original Bloom’s starts at knowledge and passes through comprehension, application, analysis, synthesis and then lands at evaluation. The new “rip ‘n mix” version starts at knowledge, moving through understanding, application, analysis, evaluation and then finishes at create. On the surface, this seems to fit right in – as the current buzz in education is concerned with creating and not on evaluating. But I don’t think this new version really has much use.

First, to create, you must synthesize and evaluate. So this new version takes the last part of the original and jiggles it a bit to have a product come out on the top as opposed to the evaluation of whatever was synthesized in the original. The new version doesn’t seem as concerned with the quality of the new creations as the original suggests that it did. This is essentially what Stephen’s posts points to on The Thinking Stick. The first sentence is the kicker.

School 2.0 needs to be about creating knowledge, analyzing information, and evaluating both. It’s about understanding a world in which connections and communicating with others is at the foundation of how we learn, that through creating our own knowledge not from what a teacher tells us, but rather from what we read, listen to, and watch ourselves is far more powerful.

If we are looking for a new way to look at education, I know that a product of sorts is important, but more over, I think a product that is continuously evaluated is something that is key. If I were put a new cap on top of Bloom’s, I would be looking at something like evaluate, communicate, integrate.