Lesson planning simply good: This is how

time-saving lesson preparation succeeds

Good teaching needs to be prepared. When planning lessons, teachers take
many aspects into account in advance that influence the course of a lesson.
How do I properly plan lessons? How do I get from the framework
curriculum to the individual lesson? A clear concept helps you prepare good
lessons and carry them out in a relaxed manner . Read in the following
what is important when planning a lesson and how you can save time.
Where do I start?
The basis of your teaching is always the curriculum. The valid framework
plan as well as the school's internal subject curricula and the material
distribution plan provide specifications for the content and
desired competencies . In the subsequent planning of the teaching units, you
have a free hand to prepare the upcoming topic didactically and methodically.

Structure topics sensibly

Start with the factual analysis . You will familiarize yourself with the topic
with the help of the textbook and relevant specialist literature. This is
followed by the didactic analysis:
How much learning growth should the students have achieved at the end of
the lesson series?
How can the subject area be meaningfully divided into individual sections ?
In primary school, a teaching unit usually comprises around 5 to 7 school
hours. When planning the time frame , in addition to the annual calendar,
public holidays and already set dates for school projects or excursions must
be taken into account.
The following key questions support your rough planning:
 What do I want to convey in terms of content?
 How does the mediation work best? Which methods and media can I use?
 Which topics are essential for performance surveys?
  Which topics are suitable for presentations or group projects and which do not
necessarily have to be dealt with in detail?
 Can the curriculum goals be achieved by the end of the school year?
Tip: The textbook does a good job, as you can tell from the division and
scope of the chapters how much time you should plan for a topic. It also
helps to structure the teaching unit based on the textbook.
Note the requirements of the learning group
When planning lessons, you always have the specific learning group in
mind. If you have been teaching in the class for a long time, then you will
know the group's level of learning, individual strengths and weaknesses of
individual students. And you know what works particularly well. The
situation is different when you start teaching in the class.
So that you can work efficiently with your students later on, it is important to
know what qualifications the children have . Do the students prefer to work
alone, in groups or with a partner? Ask the class teacher if the students are
familiar with certain learning methods. For example, if you want to use the
Placemat even though the children have never worked with it, you have to
plan extra time for it.
General learning requirements play an important role in the course of the
lesson:
 What about the motivation and willingness to work of the learning
group? Which social relationships are relevant for the course of the lesson?
 Are there students with abnormal behavior? What class disruptions do I have to
expect and what consequences do I plan for?
 Have the social forms and learning methods with which I would like to work
already been practiced?
Subject-specific learning requirements determine the design of the lessons:
 Does the learning group have previous knowledge of this topic? What are the
specific professional requirements?
 What is the technical level of individual students? What difficulties do I have to
expect?
 Are there any children with special needs? What differentiation is necessary in
terms of content?
Guide for planning lesson units
Now it comes to the didactic and methodological decisions . There are
many ways to prepare a lesson topic. Set a clear didactic focus . Your
methodological concept is also based on this, from the use of media to setting
impulses in student work phases.
You choose the content from a didactic point of view, with a view to the
expected increase in learning. Ask yourself : Why is this lesson content
for this study group at this point in time? This applies equally to the teaching
unit and each individual lesson.

How do I plan based on competence?

Competence-oriented teaching aims to ensure that
students acquire knowledge and skills and reflect on their attitudes and
attitudes . At its core it is about enabling children to learn
independently. Therefore, precisely formulate what the learning growth
should be based on, knowledge, skills or attitudes.
If you want to put the competence orientation into practice, you will already
make sure when planning the lesson that the learning objectives are not
directed towards the pure conveyance of facts and knowledge, but
rather focus on the independence of the students .

What does the detailed planning of the hours look like?

When planning lessons, try to take into account as many things as possible
that will affect the course of the lesson. Lesson planning is not linear, but
hops back and forth between the individual aspects.
The individual planning areas can be thought through separately, but they are
always connected to one another. Therefore, the mutual conditions must
be observed in order to achieve optimal planning.
Bring your considerations into a structure by dividing the course offerings
sensibly and arranging them in the course of the lesson. The question here is:
which activity should be carried out when?
The course schedule of a lesson consists of 5 phases:
1. Record preconditions
2. Activate prior knowledge
3. Inform
 4. To process
5. Evaluate
Herbartianism
Herbartianism is an early educational theory that goes back to Johann Friedrich Herbart (1776–
1841). With the scientific reference to association psychology, Herbartianism established the
entrance of pedagogy into research and teaching at universities.

Herbartianism was based on two main ideas: the formal level theory and the idea of the pedagogical
curriculum .

Formal level theory 

The formal level theory describes two areas: deepening and reflection. The phase of consolidation
includes both the level of clarity, in which new content is deepened and understood after the teacher
has given brief explanations on a topic, and the level of association, in which new, still isolated ideas
are to be connected with one another . This happens in free conversation.
In the phase of reflection , newly acquired knowledge is merged with existing knowledge. This
happens, for example, when the teacher gives a lecture. The stage of the method , in which the
students are supposed to work independently on the application of what they have learned,
also belongs to the phase of reflection .

Pedagogical curriculum 
The theory of interests was part of the educational curriculum. From this, the Herbartian Tuiskon
Ziller developed the so-called culture level plan. There, a pedagogical procedure is described in
which each historical epoch is assigned to the age of a student in the classroom. Later, the
Herbartians combined both approaches and developed a system from them that can be used for the
individual subjects and the associated curricula - the concentration idea.

EVALUATION APPROACH TO LESSON PLANNING

     The evaluation approach is quite popular. B.S.Bloom who gave us system of classification of
objectives, propagates this approach. According to him education may be regarded as a tripolar process
involving educational objectives, learning experiences and evaluation devices. It may be diagrammatically
represented as shown below

                                                             Educational Objectives
                                /\
                              /    \
                                                                        /       \
                                                                      /           \
                                                                    /              \
                                                                   -------------
                                          Evaluation devices              Learning experiences
Educational approach has three components:
1.Educational Objectives:  This component is concerned with the identification and formulation of
educational objectives in relation to the terminal behaviour. Terminal behaviours are comprising desired
behaviours by learning experiences to be presented to the students. These objectives are clearly
specified and written in observable behavioural terms.
2. Learning Experiences: This is concerned with the provision of suitable learning environment. The
learning environment is created by learning experiences provided for the realization of stipulated
educational objectives. While planning learning experiences, the following ideas are to be kept in mind by
the teacher.
    i) Selection of learning experiences and its systematic organization according to the specific   
        behavioursl changes.
   ii) Planning for teacher and student’s interaction. This consists of sequences of teacher-student
        activities proposed by the teacher. Selection of suitable teaching learning strategies, methods and
        techniques suitable to the nature of content, intelligence of the learner and teacher preferences.
  iii) Selection of suitable learning materials and instructional resources.
3.Evaluation: This component is concerned with the evaluation of the teaching learning outcomes.
Teaching, learning and evaluation go together. Teaching learning outcomes have to match stated
objectives and specifications. Appropriate tools and techniques must be planned or evolved to assess
immediate learning outcomes among students. The tools and techniques to assess behavioural changes
must be specifically meet the performance expectations in cognitive, affective and psychomotor domains.
Steps of Evaluation Approach to Lesson planning
Blooms Evaluation approach includes later modifications made by Blooms followers. Steps in lesson
planning under this approach are:
    1. Content or teaching point: In this first column of the lesson planning, the concepts or the subject
       matter or content is written in the form of main teaching points.
   2. Objectives and their specifications: In this column the instructional objectives in clear and specific
       behavioural terms in relation to the content column is to be written.
   3.Teachers activity: In this column of the lesson planning, all the activities to be performed by the
        teacher corresponding to the teaching point are to be written systematically.
   4. Student’s activity: In this column all the activities to be under taken by the students in relation to
        the corresponding content are to be written.
    5.Learning Aids: In this column different types of learning aids to be used in relation to the content
       and objectives are to be mentioned.
    6.Evaluation:  In this column of lesson planning the evaluation technique to be used should be written
       clearly. It should be directly related to the instructional objectives. It helps to know to what extent
        stipulated objectives have been realized by the teaching learning process.
                                                           
Merits of Evaluation Approach to lesson planning :
1. This approach is providing for specification of instructional or learning objectives in behavioural form.   
    So, it is easy to achieve the objectives.
2. This approach is suitable to achieve not only cognitive objectives but also affective and 
     conitive/psychomotor objectives.
3.There is Horizontal link between instructional objectives, teacher, student activities and evaluation so 
    it makes teaching more meaningful and systematic.
4.It is student-centered approach. The whole planning is done to bring about desirable changes in the 
    behaviour of the students.
5.Here provision is made for continuous evaluation. The learning outcome is assessed immediately as
   and when it occurs.
6.Like Harbartian approach the learning process is not compartmentalized. Here learning is made
    continuous process.
Limitations of Evaluation Approach
1.All the human behaviour has all the three components i.e., cognitive, conitive and affective domain.
   The behavioural outcomes cannot be specified only in one domain as it is done in this approach.
2.Here the specific instructional objectives are achieved one by one. There is no provision for integration
   of all the learning outcomes into one integrated experience.
3.There is no provision to evaluate integrated learning outcome at the end of the lesson.

Unit plans
A unit plan sets out your goals and pacing for specific “slices” of the school year. It is a plan that sets out
your learning goals into a coherent set of lessons. Why a Unit Plan? Unit planning provides you with a
sense of direction and organization that helps you and your students achieve significant academic gains
within a particular time period. More specifically, creating a plan to reach short-term goals has the
following benefits:

• A unit plan forces you to make decisions about what to teach and how to teach it.

• After taking the time to develop a unit plan, you are less likely to be side-tracked by objectives,
lessons, or activities that do not advance your ultimate quest for academic achievement.

• A unit plan keeps you on pace to reach your unit (and ultimately long-term) goals.

• Your unit plan should be referred to with almost daily. Given the limited number of weeks, days, and
lessons in a unit, each moment becomes more precious, forcing you to pace yourself appropriately in
order to meet your end goals.

• A unit plan provides an opportunity to stimulate student interest through overarching content that is
relevant to students. When you design your unit plan, consider what content will engage your students
given their interests and backgrounds.

Creating Unit Plans

To create a unit plan that meets the above purposes and provides you with daily instructional guidance,
many effective teachers use the following series of eight interdependent steps:

I. Develop your unit vision

II. Create your summative unit assessment

III. Translate your learning goals into lesson objectives

IV. Sequence your content and scaffold your lesson objectives

V. Schedule your objectives on the school calendar

VI. Create your beginning-of-unit diagnostic tool

VII. Create a tracking system for your objectives

VIII. Continually adjust your plan Note that these steps represent a backwards-planning framework.

This process should not be thought of, however, as a “checklist” or as a series of discrete, linear steps to
unit planning. Many of the actions are interrelated and will need to be reused or revisited at multiple
stages in the planning process. Avoid rigid adherence to each step. Such an approach may lead you to
lose sight of your underlying purpose – clearly understanding your destination and developing a plan to
reach this goal. Always reflect on the rationale for completing each stage in the process and think of the
ways in which one action connects to and influences the other steps in the process.

What is the Project Approach?

The Project Approach offers teachers a way to develop in-depth thinking while engaging
the hearts and minds of young children. Teachers take a strong guidance role in the
process while children study topics with purpose and flexibility. Project work presents
many opportunities for young children’s ideas to be valued, their creativity to be
encouraged, their interests to be nurtured, and for their learning needs to be met.
In early childhood, projects can be defined as open ended studies of everyday topics
which are worthy of being included in an educational program. Projects emerge from the
questions children raise and develop according to their particular interests. Rather than
offering immediate answers to the questions children ask, teachers provide experiences
through which children can discover the answers themselves through inquiry at field
sites and interviewing experts. For example, if the children wonder what shoes are
made of or how are they made, the teacher may arrange a field visit where the answer
to these questions can be provided by an expert, in this case a shoe factory, the shoe
repair man’s shop, or a shoe store. Children also consult secondary sources of
information such as books and the internet in the classroom and with their parents at
home.

Project investigations promote in-depth understanding and cover a wide range of

relevant subtopics. For this reason projects usually take several weeks to complete—
and sometimes much longer, depending on the age and interests of the children.

The Project Approach, then, is the method of teaching children through project
investigations. Because project work follows an unpredictable path based on the
interests of particular children, a flexible framework to support teachers has been
developed. This framework makes the inquiry more manageable: it shapes the
development of the area of investigation. Teachers guide children through a three
phase process from the beginning of a project to its conclusion. [ CITATION Jud \l 1033 ]

Project-based learning

KEY POINTS

o Project-based learning is a pedagogical strategy in which students produce a

product related to a topic.
o The teacher sets the goals for the learner, and then allows the learner to explore
the topic and create their project.
o The teacher is a facilitator in this student-centered approach and provides
scaffolding and guidance when necessary.
o Proponents of project-based learning cite numerous benefits of these strategies
including a greater depth of understanding of concepts, broader knowledge base,
improved communication and interpersonal/social skills, enhanced leadership skills,
increased creativity, and improved writing skills.
o When students use technology as a tool to communicate with others, they take
on an active role vs. a passive role of transmitting the information by a teacher, a
book, or broadcast. The student is constantly making choices on how to obtain,
display, or manipulate information.