Question

What was the most useful instructional theory or strategy you encountered in this course Cognition? How might its application be extended to atypical learners and topics?

Answer 1

In my view, the Bloom's Taxonomy was the most useful and comprehensive instructional strategy that I encountered in the course. Bloom’s Taxonomy identifies three domains of learning, namely, cognitive, affective and psychomotor. It further specifies six levels of cognitive learning, in ascending order of complexity, which is knowledge, comprehension, application, analysis, synthesis, and evaluation. Because the last three levels of higher level thinking are rather fluid, it would demand higher difficulty levels of testing. At this point, many atypical students will have great difficulty carrying out assignments or assessments. This difficulty may be apparent even in cases wherein typical students are expected to learn atypical topics. In such scenarios, students will require more externally supplied supports, or scaffolding. The teacher will need to provide explicit explanations of the organization of the teaching materials or texts.