Comprehension, Understanding, and What the President Doesn’t Get

It feels like I see headlines every day that say, “Trump Doesn’t Understand (fill in the blank)!” Recent articles in that category included “Trump doesn’t understand the Post Office” and “Trump doesn’t understand community colleges,”

Teachers know that understanding is actually rather low on the scale of Bloom’s Taxonomy of Learning. Using the updated taxonomy from the bottom up, Understanding is second on the list, after Knowledge/Remembering. Essentially, remembering a fact or conceptĀ  is the most basic skill, and understanding that fact or concept is next. Moving higher on the scale and increasing in complexity are these stages: applying, analyzing, evaluating, and creating.

Regular readers will know that I’ve referred to Awareness as the lowest form of knowledge. Awareness doesn’t even register on Bloom’s Taxonomy; it’s not even equal to Remembering. Autism Awareness? Breast Cancer Awareness? Get with it, people, we should be far beyond simple awareness of major issues.

Awareness might be where Trump falls with his lack of knowledge of the US Postal Service and his lack of understanding of community colleges. He knows they exist – Awareness – but he doesn’t remember much about them, much less understand how either organization functions.

El Presidente shows his ignorance, er, lack of knowledge or understanding of basic concepts, all too often. Communications through Twitter, statements released through his press secretary, and off the cuff comments all demonstrate his incompetence.

What I can’t understand is this: how did the United States elect this ignorant fool to the highest office in the land? And why do we allow him to make the nation look foolish?

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