The Lesson Planning
Abstract:
It was an erroneous belief held for many decades that education meant only a series of lessons and that the school was a place where these lessons were given. It has been realized increasingly that a lesson is not merely a means of giving instruction or doing out of facts. It can be an occasion of learning, for thinking, for understanding- “It can provide generous scope for the self-activity of the pupil, directed, guided and stimulated by the teacher” But such lessons must be planned in advance.
A lesson plan points out what has already been done, in what direction the pupils should next be guided and the immediate work to be taken up. It is the statement of the aims to be realized as result of activities engaged in during the period, the class spreads with the teacher.
This term paper takes an effort to give valuable information about the importance of lesson planning. It focuses the on the value, significance, and necessity of lesson planning for the proper execution of lessons in a classroom. It shows how lesson planning is the best tool that can be used for the effective teaching and learning situation. It makes the teaching and learning experience an enjoyable activity.
Introduction:
A school is a formal agency of education. The classroom is a formal place where teachers and pupils meet- the former for teaching and the latter for learning. Meetings between teachers and pupils should be occasions for learning, thinking and understanding. To achieve maximum advantages, it becomes imperative that education activities be best planned and best conducted. The teacher should create learning situations and organize them in such a way that the child is motivated to know, to think and to do. Lesson planning plays a very vital role to organize the class in a best possible manner and it makes teaching learning a very enjoyable activity.
It is absolutely necessary for a beginner in the profession to draw up a detailed lesson plan and even rehearse parts of it before meeting the class. It would be advisable to carry the plan into the class and refers to it when memory or confidence may seem to betray him. The success of a work is ensured if the work is properly planned. Without planning we shall be loitering about, applying means without aiming at the achievement of ends. It is therefore necessary for the teacher in the teaching to set down detail of thought and expressions in lesson plan. In case of a language, planning certainly means selection and gradation of the language material. It is foreseeing success or failure of a work, or a lesson that we are going to teach to the class.
What is a lesson plan? Definitions and meanings:
“A lesson plan” in the words of Lester B. Sands, “ is actually a plan of action”. It, therefore, includes the working philosophy of the teacher, his knowledge of philosophy, his information about it and understanding of his pupils, his comprehensions of the objectives of education, his knowledge of the material to be taught and his ability to utilize effective methods.” A lesson-plan points out what has already been done, in what direction the pupils should next be guided and helped and what work to be taken up immediately. “ It is the teachers mental and emotional visualization of the classroom experience as he plans it to occur”. “ It is in many ways the core, the heart of effective teaching”.
A lesson-plan should tell very simply the story, the way the teacher intends, rightly or wrongly, to employ children for a given period: what he and they are going to do. This written, “ story should show both sincerity and plan- a flexible and informal plan.
The “ story” of the intended lesson should, however, not look like a story. In one sense, the teacher is playing a role- possibly the chief role in a performance (with no play-acting, of course). The plan, therefore, should look more like a programme. There should be bold headings and smaller headings indicating: the different things that are to go on at different times, who are to do those things- (the teacher or children, or both), the instruments to be used, and a certain amount of, not every word, what is to be said.
Thus lesson-plan points what has already been done, in what direction the pupils should next be guided and helped, and the immediate work to be taken up. It begins with the goals of instruction and ends with a well-conceived means of arriving at those goals.
The Value And Necessity of Lesson Planning:
Careful lesson planning is the foundation of all good teaching from the first day to the last day of student teaching. The nature of lesson-plan may change as the years go by, but planning should never stop. The lesson planning not only important in class room teaching, but also at home where the student is to learn anything or he is to do some other work. Planning smoothens the work and is able to foresee the hurdles in advance and this helps the planner to take appropriate action to find the solution of it. An experienced teacher may not need to prepare a detailed lesson plan or carry to along with him to the class. However, he too has to have a clear outline in his mind of what he is going to teach.
Lesson planning performs some specific functions as described below.
i) It forces consideration of- goals and objectives, the selection of subject matter, the selection of procedure, the planning of activities, and the preparation of tests of progress.
ii) It keeps the teacher on the track; ensure steady progress and a definite outcome of teaching and learning procedures.
iii) It is essential for effective teaching. It requires the teacher to look ahead and plan a series of such activities, and progressively modify children’s attitude, habits, information, and abilities in desirable directions.
iv) Planning prevents waste because it helps the teacher to be systematic and orderly. It saves him from haphazard teaching.
v) It serves as check on unplanned curriculum. It provides a sensible framework to help the work, directing along the lines of syllabus at a suitable rate. The hierarchy of lessons becomes well-knit, inter-connected. Continuity is assured in the educative process. Needless repetition is avoided.
vi) Lesson planning gives the teacher greater assurance and therefore greater freedom in teaching. The teacher who has planned his lesson wisely” enters the class-room without anxiety, ready to embark with confidence upon what he understand and prepared to carry it to a work-man like conclusion. He has foreseen the difficulties that are likely to arise, and prepared himself to deal with them. He knows the aim his lesson is intended to fulfill, and he has marshaled his own sources for the purpose”
vii) Lesson planning stimulates the teacher to introduce pivotal questions and illustrations and thus it makes the class more interesting and the students can grasp the lesson more easily.
If hit-or-miss techniques are to be avoided in education, the task of education must be taken earnestly. It certainly entails hard work. “Yet it is potentially the most rewarding sort of professional work that a teacher can do, because in this planning, the teacher has the opportunity to use every bit of his skill, intelligence, ability and personality…in short, every opportunity to become a really fine teacher.” Regardless of how long he has served the profession, no teacher should enter a classroom without a lesson plan developed for that specific class.
Essentials of a Lesson Plan:
It is rather difficult to specify the essentials of a lesson plan. An outline that serves one teacher best may not server another at all. A safe statement to make is, “ The plan which best serves the individual teacher is for him, at least, the best plan to use.” In fact, successful teaching depends mainly upon two factors; a careful but flexible plan, and a teacher so secure in the plan that he feels free to change it as the lesson develops and the needs of the children or students require. The plan is to be used as a guide rather than as rule of the thumb. The teacher should have the courage to depart from it when the needs of the students demand.
The pre-requisites for good lesson planning are:
i) The teacher must have mastery of and adequate training in the subject matter and activities from which the master has been selected for certain lesson. In the words of Yoakam and Simpson : “ No teacher can map out a proposed unit or write even a single daily plan without knowing thoroughly the field in which he is working”. When the teacher knows what of the lesson, he can concentrate on how of it.
ii) The teacher must know his students thoroughly. He must not only know the fact of social studies but also what part of Social Studies will be meaningful to his pupils and how to organize his material in a psychological rather than merely a logical fashion. He must understand his students’ traits and interests in order to know how to plan for them.
iii)Awareness of various principles and techniques of teaching is essential for successful lesson planning.
iv) Awareness of individual differences in the class is another useful pre-requisites.
v) A basic understanding of the aims of education is also necessary. It will give the teacher width or breadth of outlook on the problems of education.
vi) It must ensure active students participation.
vii) It is essential in planning to know as accurately as possible what knowledge of the topic the children already posses.
Marks of a Good Lesson Plan:
In order that a teacher may make a suitable lesson-plan as his guide, he should know the essential elements of a good lesson plan.
These are as follows:
a) A good lesson plan should be preferably written.
b) Objectives, both general and specific, should be clearly stated.
c) The lesson plan ought to be built on the appreciative background of the class. In other words, it should be related to the previous works or lessons.
d) The materials of instruction or subject- mater should be well selected and organized.
e) A good lesson plan indicates well-selected and directed learning activities of the students.
f) The plan is to indicate all apparatus that can be used for the particular period- maps, charts, and diagrams on the blackboard, films and other audio-visual aids.
g) A good lesson plan includes one or two definite assignments for pupils. An assignment projects the immediate lesson into the next situation.
h) The references or the readings should be indicated in the plan.
i) No lesson plan is complete without including certain evaluation exercise. These exercises may be in the form of recapitulatory questions, problems to be solved and assimilation tests.
j) There should be clear indication of the time allotment of the class to be taught, of the average age of pupils, of the subject or units and the sub-unit.
k) Each lesson plan should have a place for self-criticism. After the plan is completed and used in an actual situation, the teacher should criticize and write into the plan all the improvements for future reference.
Stages in a Daily Lesson Plan:
The objective of lesson planning is to discover the elements to be taught during the teaching of the lessons. This planning has to be done in an appropriate manner and style.
In the planning of daily lesson, there are three different stages, they are as follows:
a) Pre-Teaching Planning
b) Planning During Teaching
c) Post-Teaching Planning.
a) Pre-Teaching Planning: Before teaching a lesson to a class, the teacher prepares note at home. Then he thinks over everything of the lesson i.e. what he is going to present, how he is going to present, what technique he is going to use, which audio-visual aids he is going to make use of etc. These preparations are Pre-Teaching Planning.
b)Planning During Teaching: Planning is important at each step of a lesson. It is well known fact that planning is of unique importance before going to the classroom, and planning at the time of actual teaching is all the more important. While actually teaching in the class, the teacher is to plan the blackboard writing in systematic way, plan the activities of the students etc. The teachers also should know what type of mistakes the students would commit and on the spot he tries to think of their solution too. Whatever is presented to the students and whatever is to be done by them all needs to be very systematic. The point is that planning is very much needed even when the lesson is in progress.
c) Post-Teaching Planning: Post-Teaching Planning is that stage when the teacher has finished the classroom teaching. At this state, he is to see how far he has been successful in teaching. He also brings to his mind the good and bad points of his teaching. He plans about the correction of written work enlisting the mistakes of the students, preparation of exercises for improvement etc.
By and large we find that the three stages are very important from planning point of view. The success of a lesson depends upon a number of factors. A good lesson plan alone doesn’t ensure its excellent teaching. So there is a need of good teacher and a good lesson plan. Only then we can have satisfactory execution.
Types of Lessons:
As per the book “ Methods and Techniques of Teaching” by S.K Kochhar, There are three types of Lesson Plans, They are as follows:
a) Knowledge Lesson
b) The Skill Lesson
c) The Appreciation Lesson
a) Knowledge Lesson:
For imparting knowledge in a systematic manner, a set of procedure has to be followed. Certain psychological units of the lesson have to be decided. Various attempts have been made from time to time to evolve the different steps. Here is a comparative study of these steps given by Herbert, Herbertians and Dewey:
Herbert Herbertians Dewey
Clearness Preparation Coming upon a problem
Presentation or difficulty
Association Comparison and Gathering data making a
Abstraction hypothesis
System Generalisation Developing a Theory
Method Application Verifying the theory
b) Skill Lesson:
To learn various skills is a human need. Psychology has confirmed the claim that the use of muscles is not only for the body; it is also good for the mind. “No impression without expression”, clearly speaks of the value of skill. Rousseau wrote a long time back, “ If I have made my meaning clear, you ought to realize how bodily exercise and mutual work unconsciously arouse thought and reflection in my pupil. He must work like a peasant and think like a philosopher if he is not to be as idle as a savage”. No wonder great importance is attached to skill lessons.
The arts of reading, writing, counting, speaking and singing, the representational art of drawing, painting and modeling, and crafts like wood-work, metal-work, cookery and needlework, while they contain intellectual elements and involve knowledge, are the first and foremost affairs of skill. Not only that. We are not only to be concerned with the teaching of the techniques of the skills but also with its creative aspects.
Methods of teaching Skill:
A skill may be taught by any of the following techniques:
i) Demonstration
ii) Verbal Instruction.
c) The Appreciation Lesson:
The appreciation lesson aims at developing the aesthetic sense of the pupils. It aims to enable the pupils to appreciate beauty as expressed in color, form and sound. The main objective of such type of lesson is to develop the emotions against the acquisition of skill or knowledge. It is said, “ Youth wants colour, life, passion, the poetry of revolt”. As such aesthetic cannot be neglected in school.
It is believed that aesthetic appreciation cannot be taught but like religion, it can be at least “caught”. Some critics declare that formal lessons are a snare, perhaps an obstacle to emotional enjoyment-but it needs to be emphasized that aesthetics cannot be neglected in the school. The pupils have to be given training for discerning and enjoying beautiful or other excellence, especially in art, music and literature. Human mind can arise above surroundings and can experience a sense of beautiful even in unlikely places.
A lesson in appreciation is for enjoyment and requires stirring of feelings and emotions. As such teaching it with formal steps may not be useful. No definite procedure for the conduct of such lesson can be suggested.
The three types of lessons have been discussed not that the three aims-to impart knowledge; to impart skill and to enable the pupils to appreciate- are to be achieved exclusive of each other. To know, to feel and to do are the ultimate of living; they are indissolubly bound together. Any analysis of method is so far formal and artificial, and the teacher together with his pupils must achieve synthesis, which reunites the components in experience. The teacher is greater than the method he uses, and the students are greater than teacher, for the teacher is to serve the students, and to help them to achieve their freedom. This aim transcends all, for the purpose of education is to enable the child to live a richer life by development of his natural powers within the framework of society. Thus a proper planning and execution of teaching materials would be a great help in this matter.
Specimen of a Lesson Plan
Teachers Name: XYZ
Subject: English
Class: X
Topic: The Umbrella Man
(Intensive Reading)
Instructional Aids to be used:
Blackboard, Chalk, Flash Cards, Charts and Diagrams showing the picture of a pavement.
Instructional Objectives in Behaivoural Terms:
Knowledge:
i) The students will acquire the knowledge of new words and phrases
ii) They should be able to recognize and also recall those words.
Understanding:
The students should be able to understand the ideas given in the prose lesson.
Skills:
The students should to able to develop the different linguistic skill such as
listening , speaking, reading and writing.
Application:
i) The students should be able to make use of few words in their day to day life situations
ii) They should be able to read the newspaper and other such reading materials better way.
Subject Matter:
Lesson No. 1 – The Umbrella Man
Thought Content:
The narrator is a girl of twelve years. She is narrating the incident that has happened with her and her mother yesterday. Yesterday she went to the dentist with her mother. Her tooth had to be filled. The dentist filled her teeth and then they went to a café. The mother had coffee and the girl enjoyed the ice-cream. But then when they came out to the street, it started raining. They looked for a taxi and the mother wished that they had a car of their own. Just then an old man of about seventy, came up to them. He looked rich and had a costly silken umbrella over his head. In a very polite and gentle way, he said he was in trouble and wanted some help. The mother was always suspicious of strangers. So she looked at him with suspicion. As a result she did not trust the stranger.
Previous Knowledge Testing:
In order to test the knowledge of the students, the teacher would ask the following questions: -
i) Name the lessons that you have read from your book.
ii) What does the word ‘Umbrella’ mean?
iii) Have you read the lesson“ The Umbrella Man I”?
iv) How many persons are there in the story?
Announcement of the Topic:
Once the teacher finds out the lack of knowledge of the students on that particular story. He will begin as, “ Dear students, we shall study the lesson entitled “ The Umbrella Man”.
Presentation:
Step I - The teacher will have a model reading of a paragraph. While doing the reading, he would ask the students to listen carefully and remember how to pronounce certain words. The students should keep their books open.
Step II – The teacher will point out the difficult words occurring in the paragraph or will ask the students what are the words they find very difficult. The teacher will write those words in the blackboard.
Step III - The teacher will take the help of pictures, flash cards, blackboard drawings to teach those difficult words and other phrases. After a good discussion, the teacher will ask the students to use those words in a sentence. Some grammar work can be practiced side by side.
Examples:
1) Yesterday
(Asking the students where did some of them go yesterday)
2) Already
Is it 8.30……….
3) Pavement
(By showing a chart or a picture)
Step IV - Silent Reading by the Class.
Step V - The Teacher will ask individual students to do the loud reading. Correction if any, will be made while a student reads.
Step VI- The Teacher will ask the class if anyone has any difficulty and if there is any, he will discuss or explain it.
Step VII- To test the comprehensions of the students, the teacher would ask the following questions:
a) Who is the narrator of the story
b) Where did they go yesterday?
c) Why did they go to the dentist?
d) What did the man in the street ask them?
The teacher would try to evaluate the students according to the answers he gets from the students and if there is any problem, he will explain it again.
Homework: The teacher will ask the students to read a similar kind of story at home. He will also ask to write some sentences using the following words:
Café, Stranger, Pavement etc.
Step VII- After the presentation of the lesson, the teacher would evaluate his performance and would try to find out if there is anything that has not been completed properly and if there is any, he would try to improve his way of presentation and will prepare the lesson well.
Conclusion:
The Lesson Plan is a guide. It is a plan of action. It points out what has already been done, in what direction the students should next be guided and helped and the immediate work to be taken up. Careful Planning is the foundation of all good teaching. A lesson plan is not a dictator or a crutch. If it is followed slavishly, it will rob the lesson of spontaneity and make the classroom procedure stilted and lifeless. The lesson plan should he adapted to needs of the class, the learning situation as well as the nature of subject. Thus if a lesson plan is done with wise analysis considering all prose and cones surely it will be beneficial to all student and make teaching and learning a systematic and enjoyable. Let every teacher work towards a better teaching and creation of better humans by imparting valuable knowledge to all students today in days to come.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
A. S. K. KOCHHAR: Methods And Techniques of Teaching
B. BHATIA & BHATIA: The Principles And Methods of Teaching, Reprinted-2003
C. GREEN G.H: Planning The Lesson, London: University of London Press, 1948
D. RICE W.H. (Ed): Planning The Modern Language Lesson
Syracuse (N.Y): Syracuse U.P. 1948
E. V.V. Yardi : Teaching English in India Today
