What’s the Most Effective Way to Write an Outcome?

The way outcomes are written will always depend on the content, the course, and the instructor. However, since outcomes are focused on what students will be able to do after completing the chapter, an outcome should always begin with a measurable verb. A measurable verb is one that could be used to help create a question, activity, task, assignment, or assessment to see if the student has met the expectation expressed in the outcome. One great source for finding appropriate verbs is Bloom’s Taxonomy of Learning.

Below are examples of outcomes for some Cognella projects. Note how each outcome begins with a measurable verb.

Example #1

These outcomes were developed for a remedial writing text at a community college.

Outcomes

By the end of the chapter students will be able to:

• identify the three main sentence types.
• punctuate each type of sentence correctly.
• describe the audience and purpose of a piece of writing.

Example #2

These were developed for a text on portfolio preparation for students applying to graduate programs or internships in pharmacology.

Outcomes

By the end of the chapter students will be able to:

• draft a resume.
• draft a curriculum vitae.
• identify three professional development opportunities in which they are interested.

What Should I Call My Learning Outcomes?

Some authors find terms like Learning Outcomes off-putting, and they worry that students might, too. The good news is that it’s not the term that matters. It’s the clear statement of what is expected from the student-reader … and students want to know this. It’s the reason questions such as “What’s going to be on the test?” pop up so often in class. The students who ask this question probably don’t expect to be given a list of quiz questions. They just want to know what they are expected to know, understand, and demonstrate.

There are numerous headings that can work. You will see several different examples in the next section.