Instructional Objectives and Types of Objectives

Over one academic session a school runs a great many activities. There are lessons in every classroom, a science demonstration in the lab, a sports day on the ground, and perhaps a visit to a nearby farm or market. None of these goes well by chance. Somebody has to decide in advance what will be done, how it will be done, when it will happen and who will do it. The plan that sets all of this out is called instructional planning.

Those four questions (what, how, when and who) are the backbone of every instructional plan. Imagine a school that wants its Grade 6 pupils to learn about the plants growing around them. A good plan answers each question. The activity is a nature walk followed by a discussion in class. Pupils will collect fallen leaves and sort them by shape. The walk will take place one morning in the second week of the month, when nothing else is planned. The science teacher will lead it, with the class teacher helping. If even one question is left open, for example nobody is told who is in charge, the whole activity can fall apart on the day.

A plan written on paper changes nothing until it is carried out. For an instructional plan to be carried out effectively, the classroom has to be managed properly, because the classroom is the main place where teaching and learning activities are run. It is where the teacher meets the pupils day after day, and where most of the planned learning actually happens.

That is why classroom management is treated as an important part of effective teaching, and why it is studied side by side with instructional planning. Picture two teachers with the same excellent plan. The first walks into a room where the pupils sit so that everyone can see the board, the windows let in light and air, the charts and chalk are ready, and everyone knows the class rules. The second walks into a cramped, noisy room where nothing has been prepared. The plan is identical, yet the first lesson is far more likely to succeed.

Every plan needs a purpose, and in school that purpose comes from the curriculum. The curriculum lays down objectives, which say what pupils are expected to learn. Teaching is the work done to reach them.

That interaction is what makes teaching more than simply talking. The teacher explains and asks. The student listens, answers and tries things out. The subject matter is what is being learnt, such as a poem, a sum or a fact about plants. The environment is everything around the lesson: the room, the materials, how quiet or noisy it is, even the weather on the day. Change any one of the four and the lesson changes.

The curriculum does not set just one kind of objective. It sets national objectives, level-wise objectives and subject-wise objectives. National and level-wise objectives are general in nature, while subject-wise objectives are both general and specific.

Teaching is carried out precisely so that these objectives, set by the curriculum, are achieved.

The objectives a teacher works towards in the classroom are called instructional objectives. They are linked to three things in the learner: knowledge, skill and attitude. Seen this way, instructional objectives are mainly of three types.

• (a) Objectives related to knowledge
• (b) Objectives related to skill
• (c) Objectives related to attitude or behaviour

A simple way to keep the three apart: the first is about what a learner comes to know, the second is about what the learner becomes able to do, and the third is about the kind of person, with what habits and outlook, the learner is becoming.

Objectives related to knowledge, often called cognitive objectives, are connected with giving learners new knowledge. Whenever the aim is for a pupil to understand, remember, recognise or explain something, the objective belongs to this type.

Typical examples of this type are:

• Showing the difference between living and non-living things.
• Doing calculations such as addition, subtraction, multiplication and division.
• Telling the meanings of words.
• Naming objects or places.
• Telling the height and location of something.

Look at what these share. In each one the learner's mind is doing the work: comparing, calculating, recalling, describing. A pupil who can explain that a mango tree grows, breathes and needs water while a stone does none of these has met a knowledge objective.

Objectives related to skill are connected with new practical tasks. They put the weight on giving the learner the ability to actually carry out a piece of work, not only to talk about it.

• Reciting a poem with the right speed, pauses and rhythm.
• Drawing pictures of objects such as a chair, a glass, a pot, a bird or a triangle.
• Brushing teeth, combing hair and putting on shoes.
• Playing different games.

A skill grows with practice, and it can be watched. So a teacher checks a skill by asking the pupil to do it: recite the poem aloud, draw the triangle on the board, show how the shoelace is tied.

Objectives related to attitude and behaviour help to develop new behaviour, habits and beliefs in the learner. They are about how a person chooses to act, what they come to value, and what they do out of habit.

• Building the habit of eating fresh and clean food.
• Speaking politely and courteously.
• Paying attention to cleanliness.

These objectives take the longest to reach, because a habit is not formed in a single lesson. A teacher sees them met not in a test answer but in everyday life. A pupil who drops litter in the bin when nobody is watching, or who speaks respectfully to a younger child, is showing an attitude the school has helped to build.

A single lesson can aim at all three types at once. Take a health lesson on washing hands:

• Knowledge: pupils can explain that germs on dirty hands can reach the mouth with food and cause illness.
• Skill: pupils can wash their hands properly with soap and water, rubbing the palms, the backs, between the fingers and under the nails.
• Attitude and behaviour: pupils form the habit of washing their hands before every meal and after using the toilet.

The objectives set out in the curriculum are generally connected with these same three types, and they can be fulfilled only through teaching and learning activities. For that reason a teacher must prepare a practical instructional plan, one that makes clear which knowledge, which skill and which attitude the pupils are meant to gain, and which activities will get them there.