Page 91 - Making Instruction Work

chap 7 3/14/97 1:21 PM Page 77

course objectives 77

experienced developer, write objectives only for those
skills you are certain your students do not already pos-
sess.)
How much detail should you use? Just enough so that
someone else reading the objective would understand it
the way you do. How to find out? Show your draft to one
or two people and ask them to tell you what they think
it means. It doesn’t matter if they don’t understand the
technical content of the objective. If they don’t say what
you want them to say, don’t argue. Fix the objective.

4. Test your objectives for completeness. Each one will be
good enough when you can answer yes to the following
questions:

a. Does it say what someone will be doing when demon-
strating accomplishment of the objective (e.g., writ-
ing, solving, disassembling)?

b. Does it describe the important conditions that will
exist while the performing is being done (e.g., “given
a wiring diagram”; “from memory”; “given an irate
customer”; “using the tools available in the Happy
Hair Styling Kit”)?

c. Does it tell how to recognize when the performance
will be considered satisfactory (e.g., “it operates to
within plus or minus two degrees”; “all customer
objections have been addressed”; “correct to within
one decimal”; “polished to a 63 finish”)?

5. If you have completed one or more goal analyses during
the task analysis, and if you listed one or more perfor-
mances that students cannot now do, write an objective
to describe each performance that will need to be taught.