Road Map to Learning?

Objectives.

Are they big and scary?
           or
Are they a road map to learning?

Up until my reading and even after writing objectives is scary. Making sure that its written appropriately for the grade level, has three components: behavior, condition, and criteria, and making it not so big and scary.I have always thought that there is a lot of thought and time put into writing objectives, and for what reason. Something jumped out at me in the reading today.

"Imagine embarking on a road trip across the United States to a specified, but unknown to you destination. To further complicate the situation, you are forbidden to take a map or to stop to ask for directions. Obviously, the frustration would quickly become overwhelming and the anxiety of "it all" could cause you to give-up before you really got started."

All it took was the first paragraph of reading for objectives to click in my head. Surprisingly students do want to know where their learning will take them. They want to know that they got out of bed, got dressed, and came to school with for a purpose. And they want a road map to their learning. I've done enough classroom observations now to know that when kids walk into a classroom, besides excuses for incomplete homework, or asking to use the bathroom, one of the first questions is "what are we doing today" they really do want to know. And we, as teachers should be excited for that! And we can easily give them the answer, by posting the objectives.

In the L. H. Newcomb, et. al,  reading the one thing that I found most interesting was forcing the students to find a purpose for learning. For example the teacher removes the eggs from the female at the hatchery and then calls on students to see if they can do it. If they can't they can admit they need to learn something, and that term learn becomes more powerful when the students use it.

Ultimately, writing objectives is like writing a road map to the students education and also your road map to teaching. It shows you where you start, what "benchmarks" you'll hit along the way, and where you'll end up. It's a tool used differently yet just as effectively for both parties.