PED - Composing a Lesson Plan Lesson
Composing a Lesson Plan
Education should be exercise; it has become massage.
— Martin H. Fischer
There are four major steps in creating an effective lesson plan. First, we must look at the standards of what skills we must teach. The standards are the big picture goals that students are required to master. Read the Goals established by the College Board for this Course: AP English Language and Composition Course Description Pages 7-10.
Reading Assignment: "English Language and Composition Course Description"
In order to meet these standards, educators must then create their own objectives. Objectives have three components--a condition, a demonstrable verb, and criteria. The condition component describes the context in which the learning activity takes place. The demonstrable verb indicates the student showing a mastery of skills. The criteria are the requirements the students are supposed to meet. Following is an example of a proper objective:
Having read Book 1 of Paradise Lost and Radi O's, students will analyze portions of the works according to the prompt provided by the instructor.
In this objective, "Having read Book 1 of Paradise Lost and Radi O's" is the condition. This action must take place before the rest of the objective can occur. "Students will ANALYZE portions of the work" is the demonstrable verb component. In this case, the instructor uses analyze. It is important that the verb be measurable. Verbs like know and understand are vague because it is difficult to tangibly measure what a student knows or understands. "According to the prompt provided by the instructor" is the criteria that the student must meet. Oftentimes the criterion is a rubric.
The third step in constructing a lesson plan is creating activities to meet the objectives. It can be tempting to write the activity before the objective, but too often this results in a fun but misguided lesson. After creating the activity the instructor must tweak elements of the activity and resources to meet the needs of all learners by using differentiated instruction.
Self-Assessment and Practice
Drag the items from the bottom to the slots on the right.
RESOURCES IN THIS MODULE ARE OPEN EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES (OER) OR CREATED BY GAVS UNLESS OTHERWISE NOTED. SOME IMAGES USED UNDER SUBSCRIPTION.