Taxonomies of Learning

Bloom’s Taxonomy of Educational Objectives (first published in 1956) formulated hierarchies in three domains:  cognitive, affective, and psychomotor.  When used generically, the phrase – “Bloom’s Taxonomy” – refers to the cognitive domain.  The Taxonomy has six levels.  Originally, these levels were, from lowest to highest, 1) knowledge, 2) comprehension, 3) application, 4) analysis, 5) synthesis, and 6) evaluation.  In 2001, a revision of Bloom’s Taxonomy was published.  In addition to using verb forms, rather than nouns (so that the hierarchy showed what students do), some of the language was altered as follows:  1) remembering, 2) understanding, 3) applying, 4) analyzing, 5) evaluating, and 6) creating.
Bloom’s Taxonomy, Old and New

Old	New
6) Evaluation	6) Creating
5) Synthesis	5) Evaluating
4) Analyzing	4) Analysis
3) Application	3) Applying
2) Comprehension	2) Understanding
1) Knowledge	1) Remembering

In 2007, Robert Marzano and John Kendall published The New Taxonomy of Educational Objectives (Corwin Press).  Like the Bloom’s Taxonomies, Marzano and Kendall’s taxonomy is hierarchical – i.e., the higher levels represent more sophisticated cognitive processes than the lower levels – but theirs is broken into four overarching categories with 14 subcategories.  As follows:

Marzano’s New Taxonomy