34: Creating Results with Effective Learning Objectives, with Bonni Stachowiak

Bonni Stachowiak: Teaching in Higher Ed

Bonni is the host of the Teaching in Higher Ed podcast, Dean of Teaching and Learning and Professor of Business and Management at Vanguard University, and my life partner. Prior to her academic career, she was a human resources consultant and executive officer for a publicly traded company. Bonni is the author of The Productive Online and Offline Professor: A Practical Guide*.

The term “learning objectives” might not show up in our everyday conversations, but it’s an important tool for leaders to use in order to develop others. In this episode, we’ll explain what a learning objective is, how to create an effective one, and how to use it in order to create results.

Instructional design most often starts with creating learning objectives.

Most people start-and-finish with topics, but they are not specific enough and can lead to a lack of alignment on expectations.

• For example, the expectation to “know how to use Microsoft Word”. Most people only use 2% of features of a Word Processor. One person’s idea of “knowing” Word can be quite different than another’s.
• Another example, “Understand how the economy effects small businesses in the US”. How would I know if someone “understood” that or not?

It isn’t about topics!

“The critical question, therefore, is not what topics to cover but what you want the participants to value, understand, or do with those topics.” -Silberman, Active Training, p. 41

There types of learning and we should address each of these in learning objectives:

• Cognitive – what we know
• Behavioral – what we can do
• Affective – our motivation our knowledge and behaviors

These components of an effective learning objective are from Mager, who wrote six books related to learning that should be on every leader’s bookshelf, called The Six Pack.

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