title: Climbing Bloom's taxonomy pyramid: Lessons from a graduate histology course.
abstract: Bloom's taxonomy was adopted to create a subject-specific scoring tool for histology multiple-choice questions (MCQs). This Bloom's Taxonomy Histology Tool (BTHT) was used to analyze teacher- and student-generated quiz and examination questions from a graduate level histology course. Multiple-choice questions using histological images were generally assigned a higher BTHT level than simple text questions. The type of microscopy technique (light or electron microscopy) used for these image-based questions did not result in any significant differences in their Bloom's taxonomy scores. The BTHT levels for teacher-generated MCQs correlated positively with higher discrimination indices and inversely with the percent of students answering these questions correctly (difficulty index), suggesting that higher-level Bloom's taxonomy questions differentiate well between higher- and lower-performing students. When examining BTHT scores for MCQs that were written by students in a Multiple-Choice Item Development Assignment (MCIDA) there was no significant correlation between these scores and the students' ability to answer teacher-generated MCQs. This suggests that the ability to answer histology MCQs relies on a different skill set than the aptitude to construct higher-level Bloom's taxonomy questions. However, students significantly improved their average BTHT scores from the midterm to the final MCIDA task, which indicates that practice, experience and feedback increased their MCQ writing proficiency. Anat Sci Educ 10: 456-464. © 2017 American Association of Anatomists.
authors.affiliation: Office of Medical Student Education, University of Michigan Medical School, Ann Arbor, Michigan.
authors.forename: Nikki B
authors.initials: NB
authors.lastname: Zaidi
authors.affiliation: Universty of Michigan Medical School, Ann Arbor, Michigan.
authors.forename: Charles
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Hwang
authors.affiliation: Universty of Michigan Medical School, Ann Arbor, Michigan.
authors.forename: Sara
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Scott
authors.affiliation: Universty of Michigan Medical School, Ann Arbor, Michigan.
authors.forename: Stefanie
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Stallard
authors.affiliation: Office of Medical Student Education, University of Michigan Medical School, Ann Arbor, Michigan.|Department of Learning Health Sciences, University of Michigan Medical School, Ann Arbor, Michigan.|Office of the Curriculum, School of Medicine, Baylor College for Medicine, Houston, Texas.
authors.forename: Joel
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Purkiss
authors.affiliation: Department of Learning Health Sciences, University of Michigan Medical School, Ann Arbor, Michigan.|Department of Cell and Developmental Biology, University of Michigan Medical School, Ann Arbor, Michigan.
authors.forename: Michael
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Hortsch
mesh_terms: D000073978:Academic Performance; D002755:Choice Behavior; D003071:Cognition; D004504:Education, Medical, Undergraduate; D004521:Educational Measurement / Q000379:methods*; D005246:Feedback; D005260:Female; D006653:Histology / Q000193:education*; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D013337:Students, Medical / Q000523:psychology*
keywords: Bloom's taxonomy; assessment; graduate education; histology education; medical education; microscopic anatomy; multiple choice questions