CPA Study Tip 9: Know Bloom’s Taxonomy of Learning (Cognitive Domain)

October 12, 2009 | Posted by Steve (cpastories)

[A little background: My undergrad degree is in Mathematics and Education. When you study education, you learn about Psychology, Sociology, Philosophy, and of course, Theories of Education and Learning. As you may expect, most of the Psychology, Sociology and Philosophy lean towards education. One of the few things I still remember liking from my time in college is the Bloom's Taxonomy of Learning.]

According to Bloom, all of learning is divided into three main domains or categories, namely, Cognitive, Affective, and Psycho-Motor. If I were to explain it to a kid, I would say, “all your learning is either mental, heart/emotion, or bodily” – which seems obvious, until you start getting into the details on how to formulate questions which can be used to assess an academic paper or a dissertation, or the technical competence of a CPA candidate! This article’s focus is the Cognitive Domain of learning and how its understanding can be a handy tool in preparing for the CPA exam.

The Cognitive Domain (or mental) aspect looks at levels of “thinking” from Knowledge (which is simple or (rote recall) to Evaluation and/or Creativity (which is complex and involves creation of something new). Like most skills in life, you build your way up, so there is a hierarchy of learning. The Taxonomy has since been revised; below are the two hierarchies (new and old) side by side.

Bloom's Taxonomy Cognitive Domain Hierarchy

Armed with knowledge of the details of Bloom Taxonomy’s Cognitive Domain, you can easily see through what a CPA examination question is asking. From my experience, most of the CPA exam questions focus on the high-level cognitive skills, (analysis, evaluation, and creativity) which partly explains why the exam is so difficult or demanding. You are expected to exercise those thinking skills from question to question, and the “keywords” for the particular thinking level are implied or hidden within the question. You may have noticed as you were going over practice questions that questions rarely directly ask you to evaluate or critique something. Usually, a scenario will be presented, and from the requirement/question, you will see that you need to evaluate a statement or position.

I think the most useful way to use the Bloom’s Taxonomy is to be aware of it as you are studying or learning or taking notes. For example, are your notes a regurgitation of what you found in the book (lower level), or did you create something that is “new” (higher level)? From your notes or newly acquired knowledge, can you answer questions that directly use the high level “keywords“? Can you debate an issue? Can you explain a concept to a person who is an accountant and have the person satisfactorily explain to another? (That is, can you teach what you know?) If you clicked the “keywords“ link, you may have observed that as you go up the hierarchy, “relationships” appear to be emphasized. This can be relationships between bodies of knowledge, parts of a body of knowledge, a body of knowledge and a particular scenario, etc.

You may get more information on Bloom’s Taxonomy and Higher Order Thinking Skills (HOTS) from the following sources:

http://projects.coe.uga.edu/epltt/index.php?title=Bloom%27s_Taxonomy (Bloom’s Taxonomy – Mary Forehand, University of Georgia)

http://www.teachers.ash.org.au/researchskills/dalton.htm (Excerpt of sample question stems, useful verbs, etc – from “Extending Children’s Special Abilities”)

http://faculty.chass.ncsu.edu/slatta/hi216/learning/bloom.htm (Revised Bloom’s Taxonomy of Cognitive Levels)

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bloom’s_Taxonomy (A Wikipedia article on Bloom’s Taxonomy)

http://www.mindedutainment.com/content.php?id=53 (Mind Edutainment – My Thinking Program)

Thanks for reading, and I hope you found that helpful.

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