Limitations in Bloom’s digital taxonomy model

I keep seeing this retweeted and it’s doing my head in a bit.

Image is copyright © 2010 University of Southern Indiana.

It’s a derivation from Bloom’s Taxonomy, which I guess every teacher (certainly every HE teacher) has come across if they’ve done a teaching qualification. The diagram maps Web 2.0 tools onto types of learning outcomes, to show which tools you can link to what objectives.

Basically my problem with it is that it suggests restrictions on uses of things, that are a bit detrimental. Consider Wikipedia first of all. Here it’s stuck in understanding, but it’s also a great tool for evaluating (getting students to consider sources, think through complex issues about authority to publish, etc.). Seen as a platform to publish not read, it could also be creative; it could be used in an exercise to synthesise (a level that is placed on some of the Bloom models) a great deal of information and produce an authoritative encyclopaedia article.

Evernote seems most suited to remembering, and Delicious could just as easily move up the pyramid as a site of analysis around the way we organise personal data through tags, or to demonstrate a student’s understanding through the way in which they annotate their links.

So it’s interesting as a marker, to show how some of these tools can be used in the classroom, but it’s very limited and possibly a bit misguiding to teachers who might follow it too strictly.

A blog by Jon Hickman, originally published here.