All teachers use lesson plans in one form or another. Some teachers merely organize the lesson of the day in their heads. Others jot down a few bullet points about what they plan to do each day. And still others write detailed instructions by using lesson plan templates or guides. Depending on the experience level of the teacher or the complexity of the lesson, any one of these three methods may work.

However, creating a detailed written lesson plan can help even the most experienced teacher prepare and present a more effective lesson. High-quality written lesson plans can help you organize and communicate a strategy so that students can reach a stated learning objective. These lesson plans are also important when a substitute teacher teaches your class and are often required when you are being observed or evaluated by the principal.

Elements of an effective lesson plan

As stated before, a well-thought-out lesson plan will help you to organize thoughts and instructional practices. This, in turn, will help you move students toward achieving the goal or goals behind the lesson. Most lesson plans are a part of a larger unit plan and include:

• A descriptive lesson title
• The relevant unit title
• One or two distinct learning objectives
• Prior learning required by students in order to begin the lesson
• The relevant subject area and grade level of the lesson, as well as any cross-curriculum connections
• The necessary time allotted to complete the lesson
• The materials needed to complete the lesson
• The instructional procedures used in the lesson
• Any modifications required for individual learning needs
• Student assessments
• Any instructional notes that will help the teacher teach the lesson

Getting started

The first step in lesson planning is to identify the learning objective that will be the focus of the lesson. The objective should be clear so that the students can determine what they should know and be able to do at the conclusion of the lesson.

For example:

Learning Objective: Students will construct a complete sentence from two sentence parts.

After a learning objective has been identified, the subject, prior learning, and lesson title are easily determined. If you include technology in your lesson plans, be sure to include any computer skills that students will use during the lesson, unless you plan to teach that skill specifically as part of the lesson.

For example:

Lesson Title: Complete Sentences

Unit Title: Writing a Story

Subject Area and Grade Level: Language Arts, Grade 2

Prior Learning: Nouns and verbs. Highlighting and moving text.

Organizing your instructional procedures

If you concentrate next on the procedures, the rest of the lesson will fall into place. The procedures need to be descriptive enough so that when you refer to them later you can easily grasp what step comes first, second, third, and so on. The procedures should be short and easy to read.

For example:

Procedures:

1. Warm-up Activity: Using Microsoft Office Word, a computer, and a computer projection device, create a two-column table. Then compose sentences; break each into two parts (one part containing the noun and one containing the verb), and place the two parts of each sentence into the two columns. Mix nouns and verbs in each column. Then have students use the computer to put the sentences together by dragging one part to its matching part. Your list might look like the following:

   The brown bear	Summer
   was too short	ate berries from the bush
   played baseball for five hours	went to the store with her dad
   Sally	Johnny

2. After the warm-up, divide students into groups of two or three at the classroom computer workstations, and ask each group to work on putting sentences together.
3. After the groups are finished, ask each student to select one sentence and write it on a separate piece of paper, leaving room for an illustration.
4. When all students are finished, have each student present his or her sentence and illustration.

Timing, materials, and instructional notes

Now that the procedures are identified, it's time to determine the amount of time the lesson will take and to list the materials and instructional notes. The instructional notes help the teacher prepare for the lesson and provide some transitional strategies for implementing the lesson.

For example:

Time Allotted: 30 minutes

Materials:

• Word document with a two-column table of sentence parts for warm-up activity
• Word document with sentence parts
• Sheets of paper with space for sentence and illustration
• Crayons

Instructional Notes:

• Before students arrive, copy the Word document with the sentence parts to each computer's hard disk drive.
• Set up the "teacher station" computer and projection device.
• Place paper and crayons on tables.
• On each computer desktop, create a shortcut to the document with the sentence parts so that the students can open it right away.
• Divide students into groups to facilitate moving from the whole-group demonstration to the small-group demonstration.

Assessing your students

The last item of the lesson is to evaluate students, based on the goal of the lesson. In this example, the learning objective is "Students will construct a complete sentence from two sentence parts." During the lesson, students are putting together parts of a sentence AND illustrating that sentence. The assessment, however, should be on only the sentence itself, not the illustration. The assessment section should also include what will happen should a child receive a failing or unsatisfactory mark on the lesson.

For example:

Assessment: The teacher will observe the students presenting their finished sentences. Students will receive a "satisfactory" or "unsatisfactory" mark for their work. Students receiving an unsatisfactory mark will be given feedback and may present their sentence again.

Integrating technology into your lesson

There are many ways to integrate technology into a lesson plan. In the preceding example, computer technology was used for the demonstration and for the student work. The use of technology in lesson plans generally falls into three categories: Instructional (teacher), Demonstration (teacher and/or student), and Student Work (student).

The following chart lists ways technology may be used within each category.

Instructional	Demonstration	Student Work
Lecture including Microsoft Office PowerPoint 2003	Use the Track Changes feature in Word to demonstrate sentence parts	Write a story in Word
Show a short video clip with Microsoft Windows Movie Maker	Show students how to conduct a search with using Internet Explorer	Create a table in Microsoft Office Excel 2003
Use links in Word for the daily schedule	Have students use PowerPoint to demonstrate steps of the Scientific Method	Create a flyer in Microsoft Office Publisher 2003

Putting it all together

Creating written lesson plans takes time — but they are great tools for teachers. Lesson plans can guide you in organizing your thoughts, materials, and strategies to help your students meet the desired outcome.

When you finish teaching a lesson, take notes to help you "fix" or improve the parts that didn't go as planned. In this way, you can get the most out of the time you invested in creating the plan by using it again in following years.