Chapter 2: Learning Objectives Reconsidered in Light of Existential-Phenomenology and Mindfulness

Learning objectives in higher education typically omit consideration of authentic phenomenological mindfulness. This chapter considers how subjectivity is brought into the creation of learning goals in learning subjectives by first reviewing the origin and development of learning objectives, which were based on a limited, cognitive conception of knowledge and psychological science more generally, as observable and measurable. Cognitive learning objectives came with a promise that the affective domain would eventually be incorporated; this was never adequately realized due to its uniqueness as a phenomenon that exceeded the original epistemological framework. Even subsequent efforts within a broader cognitive psychology (e.g., metacognition, the self-system) and the information processing perspectives proved inadequate to expand the notion of learning objectives to fully account for subjectivity. An alternative, existential-phenomenological conception of the lifeworld, embodiment, and authentic self-realization and releasement, based upon concepts from Edmund Husserl, Maurice Merleau-Ponty, and Martin Heidegger form the basis for a more adequate educational psychology.Mindfulness, or mindful awareness, is a means of achieving this type of awareness of self. Cultivating mindful awareness in higher educational settings provides students with enhanced concentration, self-awareness, and understanding, cognitive attunement to themselves and their broader environments. Such insight may facilitate the integration of subjectivity into the learning process, the subject matter of learning, and vocational and career choices. As such, learning subjectives incorporate these dimensions of learning. Encouraging students’ self-exploration of their relation to courses’ subject matter and incorporating career counseling into curriculum provides concrete examples of how learning subjectives work in educational practice.