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For decades, Bloom's Taxonomy has helped teachers plan lessons and design instruction. When Benjamin Bloom and a team of educators first conceived the classification in the late 1940's, they probably never imagined the impact their work would have over 50 years later. While other theories and systems have come and gone, Bloom's taxonomy appears to have become the most commonly used standard in many educational settings. In the 1990's, Lorin Anderson and a group of psychologists updated the taxonomy in the hope that it would have more relevance for 21st century students and teachers, transforming the nouns to verbs and making some other seemingly small but significant changes. An interesting account of the history of Bloom's Taxonomy can be found here. The Blooming Butterfly poster was designed by the Learning Today product development team as a tribute to Bloom and Anderson and to the educators all over the world that continue to implement their vision. We hope that it will serve as a visual reminder for teachers as they continue to guide students to become better thinkers, just as Bloom imagined many years ago!

The three most popularly referenced versions of the Psychomotor Domain seem to be those of RH Dave (1967/70), EJ Simpson (1966/72), and AJ Harrow (1972).

Bloom and his colleagues felt that the academic environment held insufficient expertise to analyse and create a suitable reliable structure for the physical ability 'Psychomotor' domain.

In each of the three domains Bloom's Taxonomy is based on the premise that the categories are ordered in degree of difficulty. An important premise of Bloom's Taxonomy is that each category (or 'level') must be mastered before progressing to the next. As such the categories within each domain are levels of learning development, and these levels increase in difficulty.

First, pick a thinking skill... Revised Bloom's Taxonomy adapted from "A Taxonomy for Learning,Teaching, and Assessing: A Revision of Bloom's Taxonomy of Educational Objectives" by Anderson and Krathwohl

Next, pick a way to differentiate content... Depth and Complexity adapted from The Flip Book by Sandra N. Kaplan, Bette Gould & Victoria Siegel. Content Imperatives adapted from The Flip Book, Too by Sandra Kaplan & Bette Gould.

Now, pick a resource...

Since the work was produced by higher education, the words tend to be a little bigger than we normally use. Domains may be thought of as categories. Instructional designers, trainers, and educators often refer to these three categories as KSA (Knowledge [cognitive], Skills [psychomotor], and Attitudes [affective]). This taxonomy of learning behaviors may be thought of as “the goals of the learning process.” That is, after a learning episode, the learner should have acquired a new skill, knowledge, and/or attitude. While the committee produced an elaborate compilation for the cognitive and affective domains, they omitted the psychomotor domain. Their explanation for this oversight was that they have little experience in teaching manual skills within the college level. However, there have been at least three psychomotor models created by other researchers.

how you can apply Bloom's higher-order thinking skills in your classroom. This poster shows the segments of an orange with each segment relating to a thinking skill and some helpful verbs to serve as prompts.

For those of you who prefer it, we've also created a grayscale version of the poster. And if for some reason you're against "oranges" and prefer lists, you can just download the Blooming Verb List. You should be able to glue the template onto a 3" x 5" index card or colored card stock, making it easy to carry around.

Adapting existing programs to enhance a digital learning environment

Tools for Teaching, by Barbara Gross Davis, offers a wealth of pragmatic and insightful tactics for designing, revising, and communicating with students about a course: Preparing or Revising a Course includes sections on defining and limiting course content, selecting textbooks and readings, setting course policies, and other administrative tasks. Creating a Syllabus lists twenty categories of information to consider including in a syllabus.

Radical Course Revision: A Case Study. In this article from the National Teaching and Learning Forum, Professor Julie Stout (Psychology, Indiana University) adapts principles from behavioral psychology in re-thinking course design, and includes sections on syllabus-building, linking grading to course goals, setting the right tone, and providing a safety net.

Course Planning and Teaching. This chapter, from Teaching at Carolina (University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill), offers two particularly useful templates: and Instructional Planning Chart (Figure 1), and a Taxonomy of Educated Objectives (Figure 2), based on Benjamin Bloom’s classic taxonomy. Additionally, the Focus of the Course section offers contrasting cases (Examples A and B) that distinguish between simply describing what will be covered in a course, and articulating specific learning outcomes.