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Lesson Goals
What's a Goal - What's an Objective?
Because the art of describing what we want learners to achieve spans the spectrum from highly abstract, value-laden statements such as "develop an appreciation for art" to very concrete statements such as "can discriminate between a work by Picasso and a work by Salvador Dali", it is very useful to get into the habit of classifying the broad, fuzzier terms as goals.
Goals describe aims, wishes, aspirations. The concrete descriptions of people performing a task can be more reliably classified as "objectives". If the goal of a particular sequence of instruction is to enable someone to do something new, "instructional objectives" is a useful term. If we are talking about a course, "course objectives", or a program, "program objectives" are useful distinctions.
However, abstract versus concrete is not the same as simple versus complex. Both goals and objectives can be simple or complex. Here are some typical examples of goals and objectives ranging in complexity as taken from various assessment documents from colleges and universities around the country:
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GOALS
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OBJECTIVES
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| value lifelong learning | Name the continents of the world. |
| be able to articulate thoughts orally and in writing | Define the following terms, giving an example of each: viruses, bacteria, protozoa, and prions. |
| possess a broad-based knowledge of business and the business firm and the role each business plays in our society | Explain the difference between formative andsummative evaluation giving examples of each. |
| have a sensitivity to and appreciation of ethical issues | When given examples of charts, you will be able to distinguish and identify bar charts, histograms, scatter plots, and line charts and describe the most appropriate use for each. |
| possess an appreciation of the opportunity and problems of managing complex organizations | Identify (based on readings, case studies, and/or personal experience) those activities that are most likely to distinguish effective. well-managed technology programs from ineffective programs. |
contributed by: Jennifer Franklin