Module 1 – How to improve your teaching through this training

Student learning is challenging, since teaching is not always effective in creating the desired learning
in practice. In order to strategically address this, as a teacher, we recommend that you keep the
following citation in mind throughout your revision work:

“Learning takes place through the active behaviour of the student: it is what he does that he learns,
not what the teacher does”. (Ralph W. Tyler 1949 in Biggs and Tang 1999).

This underlines the importance of specifically addressing how ambitions of student learning can
effectively be translated into student activities that lead effectively to the desired learning. During
this first module, we are going to invite you to reflect more deeply about how you can link learning
objectives with the learning context in order to strategically influence, what the student learns, and
how to reach higher cognitive levels of learning by pushing changes through in the learning context
(especially in terms of activating students).

Active participation: a PBL pillar

One of the most important shifts in strategies for student learning, when applying Problem-Based
Learning, is that students are transformed into active participants in the learning process, instead
of being passive recipients. The learning activities of students have an impact on what they learn,
so when students merely repeat the knowledge within the curriculum, only a lower order of thinking
skills are appropriated, as illustrated in figure 1 that present Bloom Taxonomy verbs. It is only, when
students engage in evaluating, designing and similar learning activities that higher cognitive levels
of learning are achieved. One of the strengths of PBL is that it produces student learning at these
higher cognitive levels of learning, and the challenge is to identify learning activities at appropriate
cognitive levels within the desired curriculum.

Figure 1: Bloom’s Taxonomy Verbs.

Source: Fractuslearning.com, web.

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In the perspective of Citylab CAR, learning is about the ability to enable students to produce
significant changes in the way cities develop. This presupposes that students adopt high levels of
cognition, since challenging the status quo involves critical evaluation, which is at the highest
cognitive level, according to Bloom’s Taxonomy, illustrated in figure 2. So what we are aiming at is
to develop our students in a way that empowers them to analyse current practices, to evaluate and
question these practices in order to design better ways of developing cities. In a sense, we must
have some role models of urban experts or specialists (either in reality or in our envision) that we
wish to push our students towards. This motivation also lies at the heart of PBL, since it is oriented
towards empowering students to conduct research, integrate theory and practice, and apply
knowledge and skills to develop a viable solution to a defined problem (Savey 2006).

Figure 2. Bloom’s taxonomy. From Olsen and Pedersen (2008:15).

As we aim to change what our students learn, we need to consider how we teach them, with special
focus on how we can activate students in a way that make them engage with and learn what we
intend. As a teacher, it represents – so to say – our problem-oriented project to figure out how to
develop an effective strategy for student learning based on the motivations developed during
guideline 1 (and further developed throughout the revision of the course). In relation to this process,
PBL represents a conceptual inspiration for action that has proven effective in producing the desired
results. Each teacher needs to be able to develop the ability to critically reflect about how the
intonation of PBL should be for their own course. If you mainly took a teaching method from this
online training and applied it, then you would only gain competences at the lower end of Bloom’s
Taxonomy. However, through deeper reflections about how an effective PBL teaching strategy
would look for your specific course brings your competences up the highest levels of Bloom’s
Taxonomy. This way of dealing with the complexity of having to make difficult conceptual choices is
at the heart of doing PBL.

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We wish to challenge the way that we groom students for their future jobs. This involves, again, the
ability to critically evaluate our own teaching practice and the learning practice of students in order
to enable us to produce meaningful changes in our teaching that will lead towards a new form of
grooming of students (and hence the proposed problem-orientation in the training modules).

Formulating forms of active participation

Formulation and development of competences is at the heart of course preparations, where
Learning Objectives represent an important pillar that ensure coherence in relation to competence
development. Within teaching theory, Bloom’s taxonomy represents a way to classify Learning
Objectives into different levels of complexity and specificity (Biggs and Tang 1999). This
classification, illustrated in figure 2 is sometimes misunderstood as a stairway that indicates that
higher levels of cognition should build on basic pillars relating to lower levels of cognition. This is,
however, not how the classification should be interpreted, since it simply represents a way to
illustrate that different levels of cognition may be represented in learning. When applying PBL to a
course, the intention is to directly and immediately target high levels of cognition in Bloom’s
taxonomy. By working with these levels of cognitive learning, students will automatically draw upon
and develop lower levels of learning as well.

Traditionally, lecture-based education is mainly focused on ensuring that students appropriate a

disciplinary curriculum, like math, social science and the like. The students are often trained in
learning the curriculum by heart, reciting it, explaining it or perhaps solve simple exercises. A major
argumentation for shifting away from the ‘engineering science’ model (lecturing) in engineering
curriculum was that engineering graduates were unable to practice in industry, according to both
industry and academia (Dym et al. 2005). The lecture-based model do simply not enable students
to apply the knowledge that they learn – they need to learn this after their studies. Such a basic
understanding of disciplinary knowledge is of course crucial to learn, but research shows that true
experts excel in their disciplines through the fact that they are able to apply disciplinary knowledge
in complex and differing situations. This involves a sense of reflexivity and application of knowledge
much more complex than simple disciplinary know-how. With PBL, the intention is that students
BOTH learn the disciplinary knowledge AND how to apply this in practical and complex situations,
at once. The experience is that students adapt and apply the disciplinary knowledge in a very
different way, when the learning process activates the student better and present these with more
complex issues to address.

Developing effective Learning Objectives

The principle of ‘constructive alignment’ developed in teaching theory by Biggs and Tang (1999)
underlines the need to align learning activities with intended learning outcomes and assessment
approaches, as illustrated on figure 3. In that way, Learning Objectives could be understood as
statements of learning outcomes that reflect what the teacher wants the learning outcomes to be
and how these are supported through learning activities and assessments.

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Figure 3: The Principle of Constructive Alignment. Source: Khadri (web) based on Biggs and Tang
(1999).

In the following, we will unfold how Learning Objectives can be used as a strategic ‘device’ to
incorporate PBL into a course or studio and what this demands of the teacher during the preparation
phase. Our main focus here is on the top-circle in figure 3, while the other circles will be dealt with
in other modules.

In order to adopt PBL oriented Learning Objectives, you need, as a teacher, to reflect more actively
about what it is that you want to achieve in terms of the outcome of your teaching. Not only in the
traditional understanding of learning outcome (= producing knowledge), but also in terms of
broader contributions to professional and societal developments. According to Barrows and
Tamblyn (1980), a core issue in relation to PBL is to think of education as an applied science in the
sense that students should be prepared for the tasks they will perform as professional practitioners
after the studies. In that sense, the content of the intended learning outcomes is important to
consider. Their argument is that “since the medical student is to become a physician, the expected
outcomes can be identified by defining the tasks a physician is expected to perform competently”
(1980:3). We have developed two learning activities for this module that invites you to reflect about
this question and to link this to potential teaching strategies.

Focusing on enactment does not only change the perspective on which Learning Objectives to
address in a course or studio, it also increases the motivation of students by providing a deeper
sense of meaning to their studies. This element of motivation supports their engagement in the
learning process and thereby makes learning much more challenging and fun.

Formulating Learning Objectives through verbs

Once you have an overview of the abilities that you wish your students to learn, you have to begin
formulating these into Learning Objectives. In order to support the link between enactment and
abilities, it is a good idea to formulate Learning Objectives through strategically chosen verbs and
sentences that captures the aforementioned intentions. Bloom’s Taxonomy provides an excellent
starting point for choosing appropriate verbs at different levels of learning. In this model, verbs are
divided into factual (knowledge), conceptual (skills) and procedural (competences) levels of
learning. We would recommend that you start with the procedural levels of learning, since this
should reflect your intention of enabling your students to produce an effect on the world by

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creating, evaluating and analysing. After having formulated Learning Objectives at this level, you
can begin to deconstruct how elements on the factual and conceptual level can support
development of abilities at the procedural level. We recommend to formulate 6-8 key Learning
Objectives for a single course or studio, divided into these three levels:

A student who has completed the Illustrative example: Learning objectives from the 5 ECTS
course ‘Design of Urban Infrastructure’ within the AAU
course/studio:
programme of Urban, Energy and Environmental Planning.
1) Knowledge:
- has knowledge about… A student who has completed the course in ‘Design of Urban
- can describe… Infrastructure’:
- can identify…
Knowledge
- can summarize…
- Should be able to describe correlations between urban
2) Skills: structures, urban quality and sustainability.
- can analyse… - Should be able to explain key challenges that
- can choose… prevailing urban structures result in with regards to
- can demonstrate… sustainable development
- Should be able to identify different theoretical and
- distinguish…
methodological approaches to analyse urban
3) Competences: structures.
- can evaluate…
- can produce… Skills
- can arrange… - Should be able to demonstrate connections between
urban structures and technical infrastructures.
- can convince…
- Should be able to map how technical infrastructure is
coupled to the city.
- Should be able to argue how a given urban design
contributes to place making.
- Should be able to calculate urban density for a given
area.

Competences
- Should be able to judge which sustainable alternatives
that are suitable for development of prevailing urban
infrastructures.
- Should be able to develop a structural proposal for
sustainable alternatives for a local neighbourhood
through application of a 3D visualisation tool.
- Should be able to critically reflect about the
importance of technical and societal interplays in the
city in relation to structural challenges.

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Formulation of Learning Objectives represents a delicate process, and it is often difficult in the re-
design of a new course or studio to be spot on the desired intentions. It is simply very difficult to
foresee the right combination of abilities and formulation of Learning Objectives. As a result, PBL
oriented Learning Objectives should be revised and adjusted, as the course or studio is repeated
(see more under Feedback and Assessments). In that way, the Learning Objectives can capture the
intentions better and better over time, which also leads to a more profound and recurrent reflection
about what abilities are needed from our candidates in society.

In some cases, formal Learning Objectives are fixed due to accreditation, and in this case, we would
suggest that you think of the above as your way of interpreting the formal Learning Objectives,
which are often quite general. So even in such a case – although the formal Learning Objectives are
not changed – it is a good idea that you formulate your own informal interpretation, following the
guideline above. In this case, it is of course very important that there is a clear link between the
formal and informal Learning Objectives.

Ensuring operational Learning Objectives

In order for the Learning Objectives to be operational for the learning process, these need to be
clear and measurable in the sense of the ability to evaluate and test, whether the objectives have
been reached. The students need – at least at the end of the course or studio – to be able to
understand what they should have intended to learn and what they have actually learnt and why
this was relevant. One way of ensuring measurable Learning Objectives is to ensure that these
reflect intended activities needed to reach the intended outcome of the course or studio. The
Learning Objectives should also somehow reflect the level of expectations of the teacher during
examination. In that sense, it is good to think about how you will assess the students and what
expectations you have towards their work, based on the progression of the study. We have included
some examples of learning objectives for PBL-oriented courses from participating universities.