Promoting Cognitive Complexity in Graduate Written Work: Using Bloom's Taxonomy as a Pedagogical Tool to Improve Literature Reviews

The article applies Bloom's (B. S. Bloom, M. D. Engelhart, F. J. Furst, W. H. Hill, & D. R. Krathwohl, 1956) Taxonomy of Educational Objectives, Handbook I: Cognitive Domain to the process of graduate‐level writing in counselor education. Bloom's Taxonomy is provided as a mechanism to help students develop and demonstrate cognitive complexity when writing comprehensive literature reviews. The article outlines common assumptions held by students operating at each level of the Taxonomy, typical organizational structure and content of papers at each level of the Taxonomy, and tips to move writing to more cognitively advanced levels.