ESubjects | Tips for Writing a Lesson Plan

Top Ten Tips for Writing an Awesome Lesson Plan!

Develop more than just a lesson, think units and projects. Individual lesson plans are critical, but are only a piece of a larger picture. If the big picture (unit plan) is developed, then lessons add depth and context for otherwise disjointed, individual lessons.
Create a circular lesson plan. Develop your lessons based on this pattern: Individual à Small Group à Class à Individual.

Individual: Start your class with an individual activity that asks students to draw on their own wealth of knowledge and experience. You want your students to think first about the concepts they are about to study or attempt the skill they are about to learn. This allows you and the student to assess his/her starting point and assess growth at the end of the day. Each student brings their own experiences and thoughts to a classroom, allow students to think about these things individually.
Small Group: Move from an individual activity to a small group activity. Sharing in a small group allows students a safe setting where they can share their thoughts and hear what others think. This opens doors to further thought and understanding.
Class: Bring the class together. As a teacher, it is your responsibility to help the students move to a deeper understanding of the concepts that the class is studying.
Individual: Taking the information learned in the small group and class activities, give the students time to synthesize and evaluate the information and reformulate their own ideas. This allows students time to reflect on the concepts and move into a richer, more complex understanding of what they have learned.

Time needs to be well structured. Be clear about each activity that is planned for the class period.
Set clear time limits. This goes along with number 3. Tell students how long they will be working on each activity. Know when to adhere to time limits and when to allow students extra time.
Create an agenda and post it. This helps students to know what to expect and to hold teachers to it.
Always provide a warm-up activity. Follow this pattern: Into à Through à Beyond.

Into: Provide activities that introduce or get your students primed for the concepts and skills that they will be covering.
Through: These are your activities that provide the context and content for learning.
Beyond: Activities that help your students move beyond the materials and concepts into a deeper understanding of the skills and concepts taught.

Vary activities to address multiple learning styles.
Let there be movement and talking. Of course, this doesn’t mean allowing students free time to discuss what they ate for dinner last night (unless that is part of the activity, of course). Give them activities that provide for structured movement and discussion. Give them purpose and above all make sure you help them to tie all activities back into the larger concepts.
Don’t assign homework for homework’s sake. Homework needs to be an extension of concepts and activities. We don’t like busy work, neither do our students.
Have a clear opening and closing. Wrap up the class by having students summarize what they learned for that day through discussion, journal writing, role play, hot seat, etc.