Making Sense of Synthesis and Evaluation

Synthesis and evaluation sit at the top of Bloom’s Taxonomy:

• Knowledge
• Comprehension
• Application
• Analysis
• Synthesis
• Evaluation

These are the most challenging levels.

What we aim for when we’re challenging learners and helping them master the lesson content.

Some research has suggested swapping the top two levels.

For me, I don’t think it makes much difference.

I prefer the original formulation.

Synthesis and evaluation are always most challenging.

Whether one trumps the other tends to depend on context.

Here, we’ll think about both.

And, before we start, I have a word list for you, covering the subtle variations of thought that sit within both categories.

Handy to use when developing questions, tasks and objectives.

Synthesis:

• Combine, Compose, Construct, Create, Devise, Design, Formulate, Hypothesise, Integrate, Merge, Organise, Plan, Propose, Synthesise, Unite.

Evaluation:

• Appraise, Argue, Assess, Critique, Defend, Evaluate, Examine, Grade, Inspect, Judge, Justify, Rank, Rate, Review, Value.

Thinking About Synthesis in the Classroom

Having acquired knowledge, come to understand that knowledge, learned how to apply it, and then analysed it, we reach a point at which our proficiency concerning the information and/or ideas is reasonably good.

We are well on the path to mastery.

Or the first stages of mastery, if nothing else.

By this point in our journey, we have developed a fairly detailed, critical understanding of the material in question.

This puts us in a strong position to take what we know and build on it.

To create.

To develop.

One of the main reasons synthesis comes so late in the taxonomy is because we cannot create something new until we have a sound understanding of what has come before.

For example, I cannot provide an alternative to the use of fossil fuels if I do not first have a reasonably detailed understanding of what fossil fuels are, how they work and why they are used.

Synthesis is not restricted to subjects traditionally associated with creativity like art, design, English language and drama.

It permeates all areas of thought.

Scientific progress is often creative.

As is the evolution of football tactics.

So are revisionist interpretations of historical events.

And new policy formulations put forward by politicians.

The point is that we need to disabuse learners of the idea that creative endeavour is restricted to a certain area of the curriculum.

Undoubtedly, synthesis may be more readily apparent in some areas than others – and may attract greater rewards – but that it is relevant throughout is unarguable.

Different Types of Synthesis

Having gone through the considerable groundwork of knowledge, comprehension, application and analysis, we find ourselves in a position where we can start to look back at what we know and consider what its limits and extents are, in so far as we can see them.

From here we can start to think about what we could do to expand these.

This is one example of synthesis in action.

Another is when we look at what we know and begin to make connections that were previously difficult to see or which didn’t exist.

These connections may sit within areas of knowledge, or they may span disparate areas.

An example of the first case is a learner who suggests an alternative to fossil fuels is to build new settlements that promote the use of renewable energy through their placement and design.

An example of the second case is a learner who suggests that an alternative to fossil fuels could be found by examining the factors that speeded up innovation at the start of the Industrial Revolution and then applying these to our modern-day context.

And a third way in which synthesis comes into play is through the gradual developments afforded by repeated, closely analysed trial and error.

We try things.

We fail.

We analyse what happened.

We try again.

Over time, the accumulated changes engendered by our trials leads to something new.

This form of synthesis is heavily reliant on analysis and application.

Each time we fail, we analyse what happened, learn from it, and apply our findings.

Over time, the synthesis occurs as a function of the trial and error.

As a function of our repeated analysis and application.

Synthesis is not restricted to these three manifestations.

But each one does, in its own way, represent a significant portion of the type of synthesis we are likely to ask learners to do in the classroom (or that they will engage in on their own initiative).

You will note that each of the three approaches I have outlined could be said to interweave.

This is true.

It could also be said that I have magnified the differences between the approaches.

Addressing the first point, as with other cognitive processes in the taxonomy, interweaving happens. It’s a reality of how we think.

The aim here is simply to provide a model we can use.

And that requires delineation

In terms of the second point, I do not think it helpful for the teacher to conceive as synthesis as a single whole.

For me, this makes the use and promotion of the process more difficult than it needs to be.

By having three roughly distinct models on which we can call, we find ourselves better equipped to plan lessons that fit our purposes and encourage learners to think in ways we feel are most useful in the context of the topics we are teaching.

Summarising Synthesis

In summary, all synthesis aims at the same end.

The creation of that which is new.

To achieve this, the synthesiser needs a sound knowledge and understanding of what already exists, ideally underpinned by critical analysis.

Different approaches to synthesis can be used and these reflect the different intellectual endeavours undertaken in the name of creativity.

That these approaches are similar is admitted, that they are identical is not.

Finally, in terms of teaching, it remains the case that rough, yet practical, models are nearly always preferable to perfect yet cumbersome theories.

That is the case here.

Thinking About Evaluation in the Classroom

We move now to evaluation, which can be thought of as the peak of the taxonomy, the equal of synthesis, or the fifth level of six (below synthesis, if that is your preference).

Here we are concerned with judgement and assessment, with the ability to rank, value and appraise.

It is the first of these keywords which, for me, gives us the greatest insight into the nature of evaluation.

Passing judgement means coming to some type of informed decision on a matter of import.

That import might be personal, moral, or, as in the case of much teaching and learning, made important due to the behest of someone else (in this case, the teacher).

Of course, we often make decisions and pass judgement on inconsequential matters, yet I would venture to say that their very inconsequentiality serves to make them matters on which little of our intellectual capacities are exercised.

This means the judgements we form are not particularly evaluative.

Like the subjects to which they refer, they carry little depth.

When it comes to teaching and learning, we want our learners to develop good judgement, sound judgement and the ability to make informed, critical judgements.

Each of these descriptors indicates the extent to which evaluation applied in the context of the classroom has meaning.

That meaning derives from two facts.

First, that it connects to the learning in which learners engage and that learning is deemed important.

Second, that it connects to the critical faculties of the learners we teach, and these are widely viewed, quite rightly, as inherently good to possess.

This brief diversion serves to illustrate the fact that the notion of judgement is a large sphere but that, when it comes to our purposes, we are focussed on the area that is relevant and of consequence in the context of learning.

When we ask learners to make a judgement, we ask them to take all that they know and understand about a topic and use this to weigh up the relative merits of some particular thing.

These merits are considered in light of certain criteria.

The act of judging always involves the invocation of something against which the judgement rests.

(You can’t make a judgement without some point of reference. And this is what criteria provide.)

For example, if I ask a learner to assess whether or not a story has a good ending, the quality of their judgement will rest in large part on their knowledge and understanding of what constitutes a good ending as well as their ability to call this into action for the purposes of a critical comparison to the ending in question.

Here we can see the proof of the maxim that wisdom comes from experience.

While this is not always the case, it often is.

And this is because through experience we gain a wider, deeper, more nuanced set of criteria against which to make our judgements.

So, our judgements tend to become better.

At least we hope they do.

(Of course, a problem with this is that our judgements might also become more stuck in the mud, with the weight of experience acting against the possibility of new developments. Classic examples of this are outlined in Thomas Kuhn’s book, The Structure of Scientific Revolutions.)

How hard is evaluation?

Returning to the classroom, we can see that evaluation in itself is not tricky.

We can all throw out judgements at random about anything, whether we are familiar with the things in question or not.

What is difficult is making good judgements.

That is, judgements supported by strong reasoning, evidence, examples and arguments.

Learners understand this.

Even those who pay the least attention to the workings of their minds recognise that the quality of judgements runs along a continuum.

When we set them an evaluation task, they recognise it for what it is: challenging.

Unfortunately, this can lead some learners to disengage.

Often, this is because the level of challenge feels too high for them.

They look at the judgement they are being asked to make and withdraw because they either do not understand how to do so successfully or because they recognise that the knowledge and understanding on which they can call is not sufficient to complete the task.

This is an inevitable occurrence we all experience from time to time – though hopefully not too much.

Three Strategies to Try

Before we finish, I want to suggest three simple strategies you can use to neutralise such situations and help learners embrace challenging evaluations.

First, we can model the process of evaluation for our learners, walking them through the steps we would take if we were to make the kind of judgement we have asked them to make.

We might do this verbally to begin with before writing down the process and annotating it.

Learners can then use our model to make their own judgements (note how we have taken them back down the taxonomy, allowing them to engage with the task at a less complex level so that, over time, they can come to meet it on their own terms).

Second, we can make the criteria of judgement explicit.

If we go back to the example used above, regarding whether the ending of the story is good or not, we can make life easier for learners by setting out what constitutes a good ending (in a series of short bullet points, say) and then asking them to use these criteria as the basis of their judgement.

Again we are, in part, taking them back down the taxonomy – here inviting them to analyse and apply the criteria we’ve given them.

But this is still in relation to the process of evaluation, thus making a sort of proxy-evaluation, that will help learners reach the higher-level process in the medium-term.

Third, we can work with learners who withdraw from evaluation to ascertain their current level of knowledge and understanding around the topic.

The process of eliciting information helps us understand where the gaps in their learning are, as well as whether they have struggled with earlier parts of the taxonomy (such as analysis and application).

Here we are seeking to review the foundations learners possess, to work out whether these are sufficiently developed to make effective evaluation achievable.

Having diagnosed any gaps, errors or areas of weakness, we can address these, giving learners an improved knowledge and understanding that they can then use to reattempt the evaluation we have asked them to do.

We might be able to do that in a lesson. Or it might take longer.

It depends entirely on what the information we elicit tells us.