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Domains of Learning

When you plan a trip, what would be the first thought popping up in your head?  Of course, the answer would be, “Where are we going?” All other decisions about the trip will be dependent on that one.  Same is the case with designing a course. As an instructional designer, you need to know what you want your learners to be capable of doing after going through a learning experience. In today’s complex industrial society, to address a problem, organizations want their employees to gain knowledge, but also develop positive attitudes, and acquire demonstrable skills to solve problems. Hence, your job must encompass all facets of learning that leads toward building knowledge, skills, and attitude.

Benjamin Bloom, along with many other influential learning leaders, realized the struggle that learning and development professionals face in courses across various domains to impart effective learning. They identified three types of learning: Cognitive (Mental Skills), Affective (Emotional Skills), and Psychomotor (Physical Skills).

 

Let’s take a closer look at how inclusion of these domains can help you create effective learning experience and courses deliverables 

Cognitive Domain

The cognitive domain deals with expansion in knowledge and comprehension. This learning domain creates various dimensions of intellectual skills that build from simple to complex behaviors. Benjamin Bloom structured these into six cognitive levels (called the Bloom’s New Taxonomy):

  • Remembering
  • Understanding
  • Applying
  • Analyzing
  • Evaluating
  • Creating 
For learners to acquire new cognitive skills or build expertise in any mental task or process, they must experience different levels based on what they want to accomplish.  They might need to commence with simply remembering or recalling facts or understanding or comprehending simple processes. Real engagement of learning begins when learners must apply what they have learned in dynamic situations.  For example, learners can learn about bicycles and the principles of how bicycles work, but until you actually get on a bicycle and learn to ride it, you will never really learn what bicycles really are. In other contexts, learners may need to show the ability to differentiate between facts and opinions (analysis), evaluate and judge different aspects of the subject and even create their own resolutions.  If we go back to the bicycle, once a person learns to ride a bike, they may need to learn the most efficient methods for riding different terrain, determine what the best bicycle is for them, or even create their own designs. The possibilities are endless but knowing what outcomes you want to achieve help create learning at the right cognitive levels for your objectives.

Affective Domain

The affective domain deals with peoples’ emotional behavior, including feelings, attitudes, interests, and formative values. Let’s take the example of creating training on weight loss. If we just focused on the Cognitive skills, the learner may not have the internal motivation to lose weight. Here is where the Affective Domain comes in. Individuals need to realize how obesity is making them miss out on adventures and the advantages that good health can bring. Helping them make positive commitments will motivate them to begin riding the bicycle and eat more healthily. The individuals can then find ways to prioritize bicycle riding and schedule time to ride over other priorities. Individuals learn to not just stop riding after losing weight, rather making health and enjoying bicycle riding an important part of their life.

Psychomotor Domain

Psychomotor domain deals with the motor skills and physically coordinated actions. Once a learner gains knowledge and constructs a positive attitude towards a phenomenon, they will then use psychomotor skills to adapt to the new learning. No one learns to ride a bicycle by watching YouTube videos or reading a book. Physical techniques must be learned by doing, including balance, steering, braking, shifting gears, and others. Each skill is built through practice and repetition. Coaching and support can help speed up the learning process. Once basic skills are met, the body remembers the movements until it becomes almost effortless. Psychomotor skills, when developed, become instinctive, so after a while, the movements are fluid and the rider can enjoy the scenery and appreciate the experience.

Conclusion:

As you can see from the bicycle examples, all three domains can work together to achieve a common purpose. When designing a course or a curriculum, start with that initial question. “Where are we going?” From that, you can combine the Cognitive, Affective, and Psychomotor domains to create a learning experience that will achieve your objectives and create truly effective learning.

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