Instructional Goals and Objectives

Activities and Instructional Objectives

Your activities should align with and flow naturally from your objectives. Activities can include discussions, writing papers, doing projects, solving problems, etc.

Dwyer, 1991 – "If your final objective is to have learners engage in problem-solving,you inspect the instructional unit to make sure that the content contains the appropriate facts, concepts, rules/principles, etc. which are a prerequisite for that intended learners to engage in successful problem-solving."

Here are some questions to ask yourself when creating activities:

• What do the students need to do in order to achieve the course goals and objectives? Is it only memorization of concepts? Probably not. Then what activities are necessary to achieve the level of learning you expect?
• What do students need to memorize in order to perform higher-level tasks? What is the most basic? Can other information be looked up as needed or does the student need to know the information "on demand?"
• What is the ideal way to learn course content if money, time, location were not of concern? What of those ways can be incorporated into this course?
• What kind of knowledge/skills do you want to the students to apply in later courses or in their internship or jobs? Problem-solving, analysis, or what?
• What learning activities will motivate students; that is, what will convey your passion about the content?
• What will the students do in class, out of class and in recitation/small group sessions?
• What must the students, teaching assistants, and you do to support students as they learn?
• What is the nature of the class and how might that impact the range of student activities?

You want to select student activities based on the level of the objectives. Following are some examples of student activities related to different levels of cognitive learning.