This paper reports on how Bloom’s Taxonomy has been used in formal mathematics assessments over three years (2021-2023) in the South African context. The framework of Bloom’s Taxonomy consists of learning objectives that are grouped into six hierarchical levels, namely: remembering, understanding, applying, analysing, evaluating and creating. This framework serves as a guideline for educators to develop learning objectives, learning activities and assessments that are aligned with specific cognitive levels; building up from lower-level cognitive skills to encourage higher-order thought. Although Bloom’s Taxonomy is widely used in all subject fields, we argue its value in a mathematical context. The application refers to the way students learn, understand and then applies concepts in real life. The main goal of this research project was to evaluate if mathematics educators use the Taxonomy as a framework in the formulation of formal assessments through aligning the assessment tasks with the levels of the framework.

Assessments are tools through which the learning of students is measured across a variety of cognitive levels, with the purpose of ensuring that core mathematical concepts and skills are measured as intended by the curriculum and assessment standards. The South African Curriculum and Assessment Policy Statement grade 10 to 12 highlights the significance of assessments to foster higher-order thinking skills. Ideally, educators ought to follow Bloom’s Taxonomy as a framework for assessments because it encourages higher-order thinking skills (such as critical thinking, problem-solving, analytic reasoning, creativity) and guarantees well-constructed activities. Higher-order thinking skills are a set of competencies that support student’s learning and reinforce student’s thinking beyond memorisation.

For this study three end-of-the-year formal grade 12 mathematics examination papers have been selected for analysis. The papers are freely available online from the South African Department of Basic Education website. The documents were analysed according to the framework of Bloom’s Taxonomy and standard procedures were followed. The results of the study demonstrate a visible trend of questions moving between lower and higher-order thinking skills as expected. However, lower-order thinking thought seems to be prioritized over higher-order which might be problematic if the goal is to advance higher-order thinking skills. These results do not only provide insight into the structure of the three assessment papers suggesting the use of Bloom’s Taxonomy, or not, but also highlight more generally the importance for mathematics educators to consider the Taxonomy in their educational work.

Keywords: Bloom's Taxonomy, Formal assessments, Mathematics, Cognitive levels.