4.2 Aligning activities with learning objectives

The first step in selecting suitable learning activities is to ensure they are aligned with the learning objectives. Each activity should contribute towards the learners' understanding and mastery of the content. For instance, if the objective is “to apply the Pythagoras Theorem”, an activity where learners have to calculate the length of a triangle's side is as important as having a video explaining how the Theorem works.

4.2.1 Incorporating Bloom’s Taxonomy

When designing the activities, it might be useful to use Bloom’s Taxonomy which was introduced in Module 2 – a widely-used educational framework that categorises learning objectives into different levels. This taxonomy includes six levels: remember, understand, apply, analyse, evaluate, and create. By mapping course objectives to these levels, it can be easier to plan activities that challenge and engage learners at the right level.

Whilst the lower cognitive levels (remember, understand, apply, analyse) are generally easy to reinforce with self-marking and formative activities, the highest levels (evaluate and create) require levels of nuanced judgement and creativity that can be hard to assess with automated systems. Therefore, if you wished students to develop these skills during the microcredential, it might be necessary to consider simplified version of these tasks. The table below includes some suitable ideas for each of the cognitive levels.

Examples of tasks for each level of Bloom's Taxonomy
Bloom's Level	Description	Examples of Self-Marking Tasks
Remember	Recall basic facts	Multiple-choice quizzes True/False questions
Understand	Explain ideas or concepts	Fill-in-the-blanks Matching activities Short answer quizzes
Apply	Use information in new situations	Scenario-based questions Practice problems with automated feedback
Analyse	Draw connections among ideas	Categorization tasks Identifying patterns or errors in processes
Evaluate	Justify a stand or decision	Multiple-choice questions on best practices Rate scenarios based on criteria
Create	Produce new or original work	Rearrange elements to form new patterns or structures