Not all Questions are Created Equally – and for Good Reason!
By Koreen Mak, Founder & CEO of Peppermint Technologies Inc. August 9, 2024
The purpose of corporate employee development and training is to maximize performance. Assessing employee knowledge and skill is a crucial aspect of ensuring that employees have not only understood the material but can also apply it effectively in their roles. Creating assessment questions is a complex task that requires a strategic approach and should be aligned to your intended learning outcomes. Bloom’s Taxonomy provides a robust framework for designing these questions, which can be further enriched by incorporating various styles of questions, like asking employees to make a calculation, provide an explanation, predict an action or interpret a scenario. Our goal is to help subject matter experts (SMEs) create meaningful assessment of learning and skill development.
Understanding Bloom’s Taxonomy
Bloom’s Taxonomy, developed by educational psychologist Benjamin Bloom and his colleagues, is a hierarchical model used to classify educational learning objectives into levels of complexity and specificity. The taxonomy is divided into six levels, each representing a different cognitive process:
1. Remembering: The ability to recall facts and basic concepts.
2. Understanding: The ability to explain ideas or concepts.
3. Applying: The ability to use information in new situations.
4. Analyzing: The ability to draw connections among ideas.
5. Evaluating: The ability to justify a decision or course of action.
6. Creating: The ability to produce new or original work.
Different positions in organizations may require the same skills, but the complexity of the skill needed may vary. Using Bloom’s Taxonomy helps ensure that assessment questions cover a range of cognitive skills, from basic recall of information to complex analysis and creation of new ideas. Taking advantage of the taxonomy helps to ensure you are customizing content to the level of learning that’s required of the employee’s position. If a customer service representative at an auto body shop needs to explain a product or service to a customer, they would need to remember and understand how the product or service works. They wouldn’t have to analyze or evaluate problems with a motor and decide how best to fix it, but a mechanic would. Knowing the intended learning outcome helps to create meaningful training and assessment for employees.
Enriching Learning Outcomes
Combining Bloom’s Taxonomy with different styles of questions can significantly enrich learning outcomes in corporate training. Here are some strategies to achieve this:
1. Align Questions with Training Objectives: Ensure that each question aligns with specific training objectives. This alignment helps accurately measure whether employees have achieved the desired outcomes.
2. Diversify Question Types: Use a mix of question styles like predictive, solution-based, or scenario-based questions to address different cognitive skills and knowledge areas. This variety keeps assessments engaging and comprehensive.
3. Provide Clear Instructions: Clearly express what is expected in each question. Ambiguity can confuse employees and lead to inaccurate assessments of their knowledge.
4. Offer Feedback: Provide detailed feedback on assessments to help employees understand their strengths and areas for improvement. Constructive feedback is a powerful tool for promoting learning and growth.
How MYNTIX™ can help you Increase Learning Effectiveness
With MYNTIX™, we make it easy for subject matter experts create training content that targets the intended learning outcomes. Our AI-assisted question generator allows you to select the number of questions, the level of learning outcome desired, and the style of question to be asked. Our proprietary tool will create related training content, generate multiple choice questions aimed at the appropriate outcome level and provide justification for why the questions meet the required parameters. The content is then imported to a module in our course builder. From there, course creators can edit any content, add supporting material like additional text, PDFs, images and video. The AI generated training content can be sent directly to our elai. video creation integration workspace to create a video based on the same content.
All individual responses are recorded and available to the employee and their manager. This makes it convenient for coaching purposes and feedback. Our skills-based training can also track employee skill level and recommend courses that can enhance the development of needed skills.
Conclusion
Creating effective assessment questions is a complex but essential task for learning. We make it easier for subject matter experts to create effective learning opportunities. By leveraging Bloom’s Taxonomy and incorporating various styles of questions, SMEs can design assessments that not only measure knowledge but also enhance learning outcomes and job performance. With careful planning and a structured approach, assessments can become a powerful tool for both teaching and learning in the corporate environment.