Learning Outcomes Examples and Template
Five documents and three sheets that place every outcome against your framework's descriptor rows and cap it at what your assessment can evidence.
Free download · No account needed
Outcome Register
Three levels per outcome, not one
The verb's level, the ceiling of the evidence behind it, and the lower of the two. A gap is a number.
| CO | Verb | Verb level | Assessment | Ceiling | Realised | Rule | Verdict |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| CO-1 | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| CO-2 | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| CO-3 | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| CO-4 | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| CO-5 | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
| CO-6 | — | — | — | — | — | — | — |
Framework coverage, both directions
| Row | Outcomes claiming it | Evidenced at the rule | Clauses named | Assessed, never stated |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| (1) | — | — | — | — |
| (2) | — | — | — | — |
| (3) | — | — | — | — |
| (4) | — | — | — | — |
A verb list cannot know your descriptor rows, and a sentence formula cannot know whether your assessment reaches the level it helped you claim.
Every guide for this query gives you the same two things: the ABCD sentence formula, and a Bloom verb list. Both are generic by construction, so neither can settle the two questions that decide whether an outcome survives review. What level does your framework's descriptor row actually require, and can the assessment you already have produce evidence at that level? An outcome that fails the second question reads exactly like one that passes.
Kenniston Institute of Technology, ME 341 Heat Transfer, a 300 level course in an accredited engineering programme whose curriculum policy asks 300 level outcomes to reach Analyse. Eight outcomes as inherited. Three lead on understand, be familiar with and know, so they carry no level at all. Of the five that can be placed, three meet the rule. One sits a level short. One claims Evaluate with a multiple choice quiz behind it, over-claiming by two levels. Nothing in the course measured the three that carry no level at all.
The coverage join was sharper. Of ABET's seven student outcomes, four are claimed and three carry evidence at Analyse or above, with five of the eight outcomes on row (1). Rows (3), (5) and (7) are claimed by nothing, and the design project worth 25% of the grade assesses two of them every term. Read against the European framework's three dimensions the verdict changes again, which is why the course design pack starts from your own descriptors.
What's in the pack
Outcome Register
One row per outcome with its verb level, the ceiling of the assessment behind it, the realised level, the gap against your rule, and whether the row under-claims or over-claims.
Assessment Evidence Ceiling
One row per assessment with the highest level that form of evidence can elicit and its share of the grade, so you can see what your outcomes are allowed to claim before writing them.
Framework Coverage
The join run both directions, with a column counting the consideration clauses inside each descriptor row that your wording actually names. One of eight still reads as a tick.
Outcome Statements
Ten worked outcomes at the level the framework asks, each carrying the row it answers to and the assessment that evidences it, with the reasoning behind every change from the inherited set.
How the Level Check Works
The three joins in order, why realised level is the lower of the verb and the ceiling, and why an unplaceable verb gets no level rather than a low one.
Observable Verb Bank
Verbs by level, each paired with the minimum evidence that can carry it, plus the unplaceable ones with what each usually meant so the rewrite is a decision rather than a guess.
Writing Guidance
Six sentence patterns that hold up, the conditions that move an outcome a level, and why a performance threshold belongs in the rubric rather than in the outcome.
Mapping Note
The document a reviewer opens three years from now: what was found, what changed, which rows are still open with an owner, and what would invalidate the mapping.
How to use it
- 1
Open it in River, or download it
Open the pack in River and let the agent run the three joins against your own framework and assessments, or download the eight blank Word and CSV files with no account.
- 2
Send the descriptor rows, not a summary
The framework text as published, because the consideration clauses inside a row are the thing an outcome half-claims. Add your institution's course-level rule if it has one.
- 3
Send the assessment list with weights
Every graded thing, its form and its share of the grade. This is the input people skip and the one that decides what any outcome can honestly claim, so the register cannot be filled without it.
- 4
Read the register before rewriting anything
Verb level, ceiling, realised level. Fix the under-claims in the wording, and send the over-claims to whoever owns the assessment, because softening a verb to match weak evidence is the wrong trade.
Frequently asked questions
Is this template free?
Yes. Download all eight files as Word documents and CSV sheets with no signup and no card. Edit with AI is the optional path, where the agent places your outcomes against your own descriptor rows and your own assessment ceilings. The rest sit in the template library.
What format are the downloaded files?
Word documents (.docx) for the five write-ups and CSV (.csv) for the three sheets, zipped together. They open in Word, Pages, Google Docs, Excel, Numbers and Sheets. In River the same content opens as live Docs and Sheets the agent can fill in.
Why not just use a Bloom verb list?
Use one, for the verbs. What a list cannot do is tell you the level your institution requires at this course number, or that the quiz behind your Evaluate outcome caps it at Apply. Those two joins are where the findings are, and both need documents a verb list never sees.
What is wrong with an outcome that says understand?
Nothing you can observe. No evidence separates a student who understands from one who does not, so the row gets no level rather than a low one. Three of the eight outcomes in the worked example were in this state, which means nothing in the course measured them.
Our framework is not ABET. Does the method still work?
Yes, and the framework is the input rather than an assumption. The same eight sentences read against the European framework cover knowledge and skills and say nothing about responsibility and autonomy. Send your own descriptor rows and the coverage join runs against those.
An outcome claims more than its assessment can show. Now what?
Say which of the two kinds it is, because they cost differently. Move the evidence to an assessment that can carry the level, or record it as an open curriculum item. Do not soften the verb: that closes the gap on paper and leaves the course weaker.
Where does the rest of the course work happen?
Outcomes sit upstream of nearly everything. The graded work and the alignment matrix come from the course design pack, the marking criteria from the rubric pack, and attainment against these statements feeds the outcome assessment pack. The programme-level view of how a whole degree collectively delivers these outcomes is the curriculum mapping pack.
Find out which of your outcomes nothing can evidence
Download the blank pack as Word and CSV files, or open it in River and have every outcome placed against your own descriptor rows and assessment ceilings.
Edit with AI