Add challenge into your lessons at almost any point by calling on Bloom’s Taxonomy as a framework for stretching learner thinking

Challenge as a Supplement

Here are two ways to think about challenge.

First, challenge is an integral part of any lesson, permeating our planning and teaching.

Second, challenge is a supplement to the lesson – something we add on. An extra element designed to take thinking and learning further than would otherwise be the case.

We can use Bloom’s Taxonomy in our planning, questioning and activity-building to help achieve the first of these.

Here, we can think about the second.

This sees us looking at ways we can use the taxonomy to add to our already challenging lessons.

The additions we make will be aimed primarily at stretching and challenging the thinking of our more-able learners.

However, they will also be open to all learners.

Keeping challenge supplements exclusive diminishes the potential scope of their application.

While we do not assume that all learners will get onto and complete all the supplements we plan or use, the point is to retain in our minds the idea that, while they are aimed predominantly at our more-able learners, every learner can potentially benefit from them as well.

For example, we might plan extension activities that our more-able learners tend to access on a regular basis.

In addition, though, we might also use these as a point of challenge with which to push our middle-ability learners and, maybe, our less-able learners.

This could see us circulating during the main activity, drawing those learners’ attention to the extension tasks and then challenging them to aim for these, even if they have not previously considered such an aim particularly likely.

Operating in this way means we can start to turn challenge supplements into a tool for pushing all learners, encouraging them to work harder and think further than might otherwise have been the case.

They allow us to re-set expectations and subtly change learner perceptions.

Another point to note is that there is nothing to stop you adapting and modifying a challenge supplement (like an extension task) for use with some of your less-able learners.

This might even involve creating two or three separate challenge supplements, with each roughly aimed at a different group in the class.

Let’s have a look at some examples of extension tasks and questions to show what some of this looks like in practice.

Extension Tasks and Questions

Extension tasks and questions represent additional work appended to whole-class activities.

Really effective lessons are likely to have these at each stage – from the starter through to the plenary.

This means that throughout the lesson, every learner in the class knows there is more challenging work waiting for them, should they get onto it.

A potential pitfall is the creation of extension tasks and questions that are seen by learners as simply more of the same.

This can be demotivating.

Learners feel that the challenge being set is to repeat what has already been done, only in a slightly different way or with slightly different content.

Avoiding this situation is important because challenge tasks should be fun and engaging.

They should be a reward for completing the main body of work.

After all, we are looking to promote a love of learning and that, undoubtedly, ought to include a love of having your thinking challenged and, through this, pushed to new heights.

Three simple techniques present themselves, all involving the taxonomy.

Strategy 1: Move Up the Taxonomy

Use a different level of the taxonomy from that underpinning the main activity to create your extension questions and tasks.

For example, we might plan a main activity based mostly on analysis and supplement this with an evaluation-based extension.

This ensures the challenge is rooted in a different cognitive process and does not ask learners to do more of the same.

Consider the different experience this engenders.

A learner who has just completed a sequence of analysis questions may feel disappointed when they are asked to do more analysis questions.

This begs the question: What was the point of finishing before everyone else?

On the other hand, the learner who has completed the analysis questions and then gets to think about a different, engaging evaluation question is more likely to find motivation in this, and to then seek to repeat the process in the future.

Strategy 2: A Different Level of Similar Challenge

If your activity is already at the top of Bloom’s Taxonomy in terms of the work it is asking learners to do, you can plan an extension that calls on a different level of similar challenge.

Synthesis and evaluation are seen by many as interchangeable.

It’s a fair point.

The classic formulation of the taxonomy is:

Level 1: Knowledge
Level 2: Comprehension
Level 3: Application
Level 4: Analysis
Level 5: Synthesis
Level 6: Evaluation

Subsequent research has suggested swapping the top two levels.

I’m not necessarily in agreement with this.

But what I do think is fair to say is that the top two levels are always the most challenging and that context is key.

Sometimes synthesis is harder, sometimes evaluation.

All this means that if you have a main activity based on evaluation, you can plan an extension task or question based on synthesis, and vice versa.

Strategy 3: Choose a Different Keyword

If neither of the previous two options are possible, use the taxonomy keyword list below and identify a keyword that is sufficiently different from that driving the main task to warrant inclusion as the basis of an extension.

For example, if your main task is concerned with evaluation in the form of ‘assessment,’ you could then devise an extension based around ‘defend’ or ‘rank.’

While this technique does not give rise to the same level of difference as the previous two, it still serves to create enough difference for learners not to feel they are just being asked to do more of the same.

Consider for example, a main task that asks learners to assess whether a new park should be built in the local area.

An extension that asks learners to defend the view that new parks should not be built, but existing ones should be extended, is still evaluation, but the focus on ‘defend’ makes it qualitatively different from the main task.

Full Bloom’s Taxonomy Keyword List

Knowledge Keywords:

Arrange, Define, Describe, List, Match, Memorise, Name, Order, Quote, Recognise, Recall, Repeat, Reproduce, Restate, Retain.

Comprehension Keywords:

Characterise, Classify, Complete, Describe, Discuss, Establish, Explain, Express, Identify, Illustrate, Recognise, Report, Relate, Sort, Translate.

Application Keywords:

Apply, Calculate, Choose, Demonstrate, Dramatize, Employ, Implement, Interpret, Operate, Perform, Practise, Role-Play, Sketch, Solve, Suggest.

Analysis Keywords:

Analyse, Appraise, Categorize, Compare, Contrast, Differentiate, Discriminate, Distinguish, Examine, Experiment, Explore, Investigate, Question, Research, Test.

Synthesis Keywords:

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

Evaluation Keywords:

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