Lesson Planning

Let's divide lesson planning into two parts: the lesson plan which generally teachers are expected/required to turn in to the office, and the lesson plan which is the script/blueprint for classroom teaching.

The Office Copy

We will further divide the lesson plan to be given to the office into two parts: the classroom teacher's plan and the substitute teacher's plan.

• THE SUBSTITUTE TEACHER'S PLAN. The reality is that these plans may never be needed, although in most cases (few teachers never get sick) they will be needed, and possibly will even be updated during the school year.
• Schools place these substitute plans on file to be used if the regular teacher is absent without a lesson plan, or the substitute can't teach the plan that was left for the day, and/or the regular teacher wants the substitute to teach the substitute plan rather than the regular plan.
• In preparing plans for a substitute there are a few things to keep in mind.
1. Substitutes may know little about the subject matter.
2. They may arrive shortly before class begins or even after class begins.
3. Students may not all have supplies with them.
4. The substitute doesn't know the room or the students.
• The substitute has a difficult job at best, so do all you can to improve the chances that the substitute will have an easy, successful day. A happy substitute is good for the entire school. Substitutes are often hard to get, and happy ones will want to return. For more on preparing for a substitute, see the Substitute Planning page.
• Provide the substitute with a plan which is self contained: one that is on a new, simple topic or review topic with all materials provided (you may need to leave a note telling where the materials are in the classroom).
• Overplan - you do not want the students to run out of work. This can easily lead to discipline problems for the substitute.
• Student assignments due at the end of the period provides both closure and accountability for students and substitute. It also supplies the teacher with work to assess understanding and productivity.
• A comfortable substitute folder would contain a five day supply of lesson plans. This would cover a lengthy absence and/or the possiblity of students moving through the lessons more rapidly than anticipated
• THE CLASSROOM TEACHER'S PLAN. This plan is often presented on Friday as a Xerox copy of the teacher's plan book for the following week. The plans presented in this form are often nothing more than a date, pages covered, and assignments given. If this meets the requirements of the administrator, and if the teacher is comfortable with this format, nothing more needs to be done.
• However, with little more work - actually with less work in the long run - a lesson plan can be presented which is of real value to teacher, student, parents, and administrators.
• What I am suggesting is writing an undated lesson sequence to cover, perhaps, a quarter. This will relieve the teacher of the weekly ritual of having to turn in weekly lesson plans before leaving for a weekend of well-earned rest.
• The lesson sequence details pages to be covered and the assignments to be given, along with the lesson objectives - information frequently available in the textbook's teacher resource materials.
• The absence of a date allows the instructor to increase or decrease the pace of instruction in keeping with student needs and mastery. Undated lesson sequences are also easier to revise for use from year to year than plans which have dates which have to be changed.
• These lesson plans could be given to students and parents. Parents appreciate knowing what is expected of their children, and students will have the assignment even if absent from class.

The Teacher's Classroom Script

Let us now turn our attention to what the teacher does in creating and writing the plan normally used in instructing the class.

• At the outset it should be understood that the teacher's lesson plan is a general idea of what the teacher intends to do during a class period. This plan is not engraved in stone, and may be changed from class to class. Some reasons to change from the original plan are: to accomodate different learning curves, the original plan just didn't seem to be working or meeting student needs, a school activity interrupts the lesson, or if some significant event (such as an earthquake) takes place (and takes precedence over your lesson).
• Under normal circumstances a lesson might follow a format somewhat like the following:
1. An entry task. This is an activity lasting 5 to 10 minutes given to check students' retention a previous lesson or explore entry level of understanding a new lesson.
2. Correction, evaluation, and reteaching of the entry task (10 minutes) to further review and raise understanding to strengthen the foundation for the new lesson.
3. Teach (model) new material (15 minutes) in small steps, taking care to cover new vocabulary, and make concepts concrete with examples tied to previous learning when possible.
4. Evaluate student understanding and reteach where needed (5 to 10 minutes). The evaluation tool may be the completion of some question or task involving the stated objective.
5. Closure (5 minutes) allows the students to draw their thoughts together and communicate in writing what they learned during the period. This, in turn, will help you to know where to begin the next lesson.

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