Aims, Goals, and Objectives...What's The Difference?

What is the difference between aims, goals, and objectives?

Aims are general statements that express learning targets. Examples of aims are national learning standards.

Goals are statements of the teachers intentions. Goals are expressed in state standards.

Objectives are specific statements of outcomes. Objectives are created by the teacher and can be measured through activities.

Mount Saint Mary College requires that our objectives consist of CBC (Condition, behavior, criteria).

The condition is the setting. The setting is expressed through the words, "Given a task/material..."

Behavior is the action verb used. Action verbs are words such as apply, outline, create, define, explain, etc. Action verbs are NOT the words know, learn, comprehend, etc. These words are not measurable.

The third part of the objective, criteria, refers to the level of performance expected from the student.

An example of an objective I wrote in class using the CBC model was, "Given two illustrations depicting the Boston Massacre, the student will complete a Venn diagram providing two similarities and five differences."

The condition is "Given two illustrations." The behavior, or action verb, is complete, and the criteria is providing examples on a Venn diagram.

While it may sound easy writing objectives using CBC, it's not. The example I provided came after a couple of attempts and discussion with my professor.

Hopefully, with a little practice it will get better.