Steps to Lesson Planning

Teaching Techniques II

What happens during a lesson?

The steps to lesson planning have stood the test of time. Here is a brief description of each. Understanding these components will add to your understanding of how to plan a lesson.

Anticipatory Set
Opportunity for the minds of learners to bring forward previous learning. An effective set will focus the learners on task, provide meaning and engage the learners.

Anticipatory Set (focus)

Examples:
Review main ideas of yesterdays lesson which will be extended today. Give synonyms for words, when the objective is improvement of creative writing. A short activity or prompt that focuses the students' attention before the actual lesson begins.
demo

Used when students enter the room or in a transition.

A hand-out given to students at the door review question written on the board "two problems" on the overhead are...

Objective Purpose
States what the student will be able to do and why it is important.
In behavioral terms

The vocabulary, skills, and concepts the teacher will impart to the students
the "stuff" the students need to know in order to be successful.

An instructional objective is a picture of the learners after instruction.

Objective Purpose
Examples:
The purpose of today's lesson, why the students need to learn it, what they will be able to "do", and how they will show learning as a result are made clear by the teacher. Given a decimal fraction, the learner will demonstrate understanding of the decimal fraction by writing an equivalent proper fraction.

Input
What you are going to teach. Somehow students need to get some information. Two important questions to ask yourself.
What information is needed? How will the information be delivered?

Input
Examples Teacher Talks
Notes

Videos Books Magazines News Paper Internet

Independent work Small group work Demonstrations

Modeling
Using visual techniques.
Matching visual to the verbal.

Students need to see an accurate example of the product or process being taught. The teacher shows in graphic form or demonstrates what the finished product looks like.
Shows students how to do a particular technique A picture is worth a thousand words

Modeling
Examples
Demonstrations Examples in everyday life Pictures or video

Guided Practice
Time should be provided in class for the student to practice the concept or skill while the teacher is present and can monitor the students. The teacher leads the students through the steps necessary to perform the skill using the tri-modal approach.
hear/see/do.

Independent Practice
This is the time outside of class when the student will work on the learning without teacher assistance. Students work on their own.
Sometimes in class or not

Homework

Monitor and Adjust

Teacher needs to plan for some means to check the understanding of individual students as well as the entire class.
Check for understanding

The teacher uses a variety of questioning strategies to determine "Got it yet?" and to pace the lesson - move forward?/back up?
Sampling the class, oral quizzing Signaling private responses
Read student cues
Deer in the headlight eyes

Direct Observation

Closure
A review or wrap-up of the lesson.
"Tell me/show me what you have learned today".

Students summarize the essential learning that took place during the class. Set up the anticipator set for the next day.
Future directive

Lesson Design
When to use all the steps or not to use all the steps

Lesson design is one way a teacher might plan a lesson. Only the teacher can decide whether this is an appropriate plan for a particular lesson. Prerequisites:
Students have been diagnosed Can be formal, informal, intuitive A clear objective is in mind A task analysis has identified critical attributes of the learning

The following may be situations in which the teacher might choose to use all the steps just described.

New learning Not familiar with students abilities, background, or experience Students who dont catch on as readily as most. Learning is of the high thinking levels Learning is at a high degree of difficulty Remedial teaching

The following may be situations in which the teacher might not choose to use all the steps just described. Review, maintenance, practice Building on previous learning (transfer) Students are operating at an independent level. Students are using the inquiry method. Previous student performance indicates not all steps are needed. Lesson is extended over more than one day