Learning - Do you know how?

“To know, is to know that you know nothing. That is the meaning of true knowledge.”
Socrates

Guys, when you think you know something, think again, what do you really know? Benjamin Bloom came up with his Bloom’s Taxonomy in 1956 to divide educational objectives into three domains: cognitive, affective, and psychomotor.

Under cognitive, he provided us with a checklist that differentiates our thinking into two categories: higher order and lower order. Higher order thinking includes analyzing, evaluating, and creating, while lower order thinking includes remembering, understanding, and applying. If the requirements for lower order thinking look familiar, you are correct; our Singapore education system makes this compulsory for us. However, we are rarely trained to develop in our analyzing and evaluating skills. Creativity is crucial in our education system, but I also believe that it has been done the wrong way because we it does not follow these 6 steps. I personally believe that you need to get the basic knowledge at the tip of your fingers before you can use it to create new ideas. Without the basic knowledge, how can you create anything from nothing?



Affective talks about emotions. Emotions and memory are closely linked because the two of the brain that are responsible for these functions are closely connected. The more emotions something triggers, the longer you can remember it. Why do companies often spend large amount of money on advertisers to come up with catchy captions and advertisements to promote their product or service? This is because they know the impact of words on humans, and how a few words can trigger one’s emotions, which would gradually influence his or her thinking and actions. For instance, L'Oréal Group, the world's largest cosmetics and beauty company, changed their slogan to “Because you are worth it”. Which woman in this world would not think that they are worth the thousand dollars of cosmetics. This change of slogan is certainly a success.



Psychomotor describe the ability to physically manipulate a tool or instrument. Why is it that some people are able to juggle with balls while others can never do it? Can these skills be trained or are they innate? How long do you have to train yourself before you can really say, “I know how to juggle”? How do you know if you REALLY know how to do it?



Try it out yourself. Watch the video and learn. =)