Simple And Easy Lesson Plan Format For Teachers
Lesson plans are the backbone of teaching. Checkout my easy lesson plan format for teachers. Also learn what is a lesson plan and how to write it.
Every best lesson is first planned. But lesson planning can take hours and sometimes days. You would want the best learning experience for your students. Good lesson planning leads to good learning outcomes. Remember the last time you planned a lesson in advance? Your students were happy at the end of the lesson and the Principal couldn’t stop appreciating your efforts. And you were no less than proud of yourself!
During my teaching days, it took me hours to plan a lesson. After a lot of brain-racking, I came up with a simple and easy lesson plan format for teachers. Although there is no shortcut to planning a great lesson, but technology can help you create visually appealing lesson plans, in no time. In this article, I will show you how to make creative lesson plans using a simple online tool. I will also share a simple lesson plan format for teachers, and a few lesson plan templates and samples.
Stay tuned!
What is a lesson plan?
If teaching is a presentation, then a lesson plan is the script. A lesson plan is a detailed guide or written account of which topic you are going to teach, how you will teach it, and what you expect your students to do after learning it.
Imagine you have to give a presentation on the stage.
Isn’t it always better to know your audience? You will plan your every step on the stage.
You will think of a compelling introduction.
Then you will plan a few questions to ask the audience, just to check what they already know about the topic.
You will also ask them a few mind-boggling questions that will make them interested in what you will say next.
Otherwise, why will your audience want to listen to you?
Then you will present your topic.
In between, you will have planned some humor and activities to keep them engaged and interested in your presentation.
At the end, you will summarize your presentation and have a question-answer round.
Finally, your audience will have learned something new, like a new skill, and you will urge them to practice it regularly in their day-to-day life.
The audience will cheer for you after this awesome presentation!
See how the steps and planning will help you on the stage?
Well, all the homework you did to get such a response was nothing but the lesson planning teachers do before entering the classroom.
Importance of lesson planning for teachers?
The above example must have summed up how important it is to plan your lessons.
I loved the way Lisa Dabbs, former educator, school Principal, and current education consultant, has explained what is a lesson plan in her blog on Edutopia.
It’s the “recipe” for the day’s exciting learning!
~Lisa Dabbs
A lesson plan gives the right steps to follow in the classroom that help you to effectively teach a lesson.
Without it, a teacher can get lost in her instruction, and may even fail to achieve the learning outcomes of the lesson.
As perfectly explained in a 2021 study,
“aimless wandering in the classroom, non-academic discussion, inconsistencies between previous and present lessons, and no effective and lifelong learning are the ultimate outcomes of having no lesson plan for a teacher.”
When teachers plan their lessons, they are better prepared and the lesson flows smoothly.
Lesson planning benefits teachers in the following ways 👇
- It makes them confident in delivering lectures.
- It helps them visualize the future and desired learning outcomes.
- It makes them consistent in their teaching methods and approach.
- It gives them a chance to check their teaching methods and progress, and change them if needed.
- It provides them the opportunity to modify their teaching style.
- It develops creativity and thinking skills.
- It helps them efficiently manage the classroom.
Lesson planning also benefits the students.
Here’s how.
- Students like to find patterns in their learning. A lesson plan provides pattern and familiarity.
- Research suggests that a happy teacher will make a happy classroom. A lesson plan makes a teacher confident and excited to enter the classroom.
- A lesson plan excites the students.
- Students are happy to know that the teachers have gone an extra mile for them.
- The activities planned by the teacher are a good change from routine textbooks.
- Lesson plan gives time for questions and answers. This builds a healthy teacher-student rapport.
Parts of a lesson plan
Now that you know how important are lesson plans, let’s see what are the must-haves in a good lesson plan.
👉 Class/Grade, Subject, and Topic-
You must include the class you will teach, the subject, and the name of the lesson or topic.
👉Lesson Objectives
No classroom activity is done without goals and objectives. An effective lesson plan MUST have clearly stated objectives that you would want to achieve by the end of the lesson.
Writing objectives for a lesson plan can be tricky.
In the upcoming sections, I will teach you how to write clear and measurable lesson plan objectives!
👉Instructional/ Teaching Aids
Here you mention all the teaching aids you need to effectively teach your lesson. Any books, audio-visual aids, educational technology, tools, and resources that you use in the classroom during the instruction.
Suppose you are teaching money, then you can mention:
Dummy or real notes and coin; atm cards; a PowerPoint presentation you prepared to show the change in old and new currency; a shopping video; a Monopoly game, and the worksheet for assessment at the end.
👉 Material Required
In this section, think, plan and jot down any material you need your students to bring from home or that you will provide them in the class.
For instance, taking the above example,
- dummy notes and coins
- wallet
- small toys to set up a shop for shopping activity.
👉 Lesson Procedure/Presentation
- Previous Knowledge Testing
In this part, write the questions or ways to test the previous knowledge of students about the topic to be taught.
The idea behind this activity is to keep your students in mind while planning a lesson.
The perfect lesson plan is one that is made for the students, considering what they already know.
Taking forward the above example,
✅ think of creative ways to check their previous knowledge about money.
✅ask interesting questions like:
Do you go shopping with your parents?
Do you put coins in your piggy bank?
2. Method of Introduction
Here you mention how you will start teaching the topic.
What will be your first step?
It could be-
➡️ by asking questions
➡️ by playing a game
➡️ by showing an experiment
➡️ by telling them a mistake and how to correct it.
For example, to introduce the topic of Money in the class, you can begin with a role-play, where you act as a shopkeeper and one student becomes a customer.
The introduction of a lesson should make your students curious and excited to learn it. You should always relate it with what they already know and don’t know and why it’s important that they learn it.
Show them examples from daily life.
3. Teaching Point with Student-Teacher Interaction and Student Activities
Plan beforehand, where to take forward the discussion, when to have an activity, where to change learning station etc.
4. Consolidated Blackboard Work
This is optional.
If you are writing a B.Ed. lesson plan then you need to plan the board work as well.
5. Lesson Conclusion
In this section you need to plan:
✔️How to conclude the lesson
✔️Key takeaways for students
If you have divided a big topic into chunks then conclude by telling your students what they should expect in the next class.
Like, if you just introduce money in one class, then give your students a little insight into what they will study the next day- Addition and subtraction of money, word problems, etc.
6. Recapitulation/Evaluation
Just revise what they have learned in the class.
Also, plan a way to evaluate if they have understood it or not.
For that, you can ask questions or be as creative as you can be.
7. Homework(if any)
Avoid homework, and even if you do, give creative HW that makes them think and analyze, rather than mere rote learning.
For instance, you can ask your students to go shopping with their parents over the weekend and share their experiences the next day in class.
👉 Lesson/Topic Assessment Method
In this part, write how you will assess the learning objectives.
Learning is only effective if it is able to achieve the desired learning outcomes and objectives.
For instance, in a lesson plan for Grammar in English, you can play the Name, Place, Animal, Thing game in the class!
👉 Lesson Reflection and Follow-up
Finally, reflect on what you have taught.
This will be done by you post-lesson.
Ask yourself questions like:
🤔Which moment were you surprised during the lesson delivery?
🤔What are the concerns you had?
🤔 What worked in the lesson, and why?
🤔 What didn’t work in the lesson and why do you think so?
Also, give a chance for your students to reflect on what they have learned.
The post-lesson reflection is an opportunity for students to pause and assess what they think they have learned in a lesson or series of lessons.
~ Dr. Catlin Tucker, Educator turned author of best-selling books and blogs.
Ask reflection questions at the end of a lesson.
I personally loved Raegan Tunstall, educator and developer of Guided Math Curriculum’s, simple ideas for lesson reflection.
Now here’s the part that I promised.
How to write objectives for a lesson plan?
Write measurable and realistic objectives in your lesson plan.
Did you find any difference in the above objectives?
The objectives on the left have action verbs.
Action verbs make objectives measurable.
If I continue on the topic of Money,
The objective- ‘Students will be able to understand the concept of money, is not measurable’.
How will you assess it?
The objective- ‘Students will be able to count the change given by the shopkeeper’, can be measured and assessed.
Tips to write lesson plan objectives:
- Use action verbs.
- Focus on only one skill at a time.
- Write short objectives.
- Be specific.
- To cover all the domains of Bloom’s Taxonomy while writing objectives:
Now you’re all prepped up to write an effective lesson plan for your students.
But it takes rigorous practice for teachers to write the best lesson plans.
And lots of time and work.
So, next I’m presenting a simple format of lesson plan for teachers.
Keep reading!
Simple And Easy Lesson Plan Format For Teachers
Pro Tip: Save this format and convert it into a word file for quick use. Or create a lesson plan on Canva for free.
Here’s how!
Free Lesson Plan Templates on Canva
If you have read my previous blogs then you must be knowing what a die-hard fan of Canva I am.
I have made teaching resumes, presentations, and Maths learning videos for my YouTube channel using Canva.
Canva is a blessing for teachers.
These are the best lesson plan templates I found on Canva.
A sample lesson plan
These lesson plan templates are free and simple to make lesson plans on your own.
But if you still need some good sample lesson plans, then here’s what you can take inspiration from.
- Sample of English Lesson Plan
Next Steps
Now that you know this super simplified lesson plan format, it won’t take long hours to do that.
Download the above templates and plan tomorrow’s lesson!
Email me your lesson plans. I will be happy to read them.
Over To You
Lesson Planning seems like a daunting task.
Drafting objectives, activities, assessment, and instructional material is difficult. But you don’t have to do it by hand anymore. There are many apps for teachers to write awesome lesson plans. You also need a simple no-nonsense lesson plan format. With an easy format, you can quickly frame your lesson plan without stress.
Hope this article helps you in that.
Do tell me in the comments, if it did!
More Resources
👉Learn how to engage students with ADHD.
By Manika Pant
A Content Writer, EdTechxpert and Education Enthusiast! Manika Pant is a trained teacher, having done B.Ed. and M.A. Education. She has 8+ years of school teaching experience. Creator of ‘Learning with M’, a Math educational YouTube channel, Manika is a content creator in the morning, a nature lover in the evening, and a poet by night.
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