92-pages-GUIDELINES-FOR-SECONDARY-SCHOOLS-All-Streams-and-Sections

The merits of lesson planning
Lesson planning is considered as a good practice and a sign of professionalism, because improvisation has been
proven to be counter-productive, especially when teachers are either novice or lack adequate training. Lesson
planning can also contribute to teachers’ development. Lesson planning has a great pedagogical value in that it:
• gives both teachers and learners a sense of direction;
• helps learners become aware of goals implicit in the learning tasks they are to perform;
• reduces problems pertaining to classroom management (smoothly running classes with very few
breakdowns );
• gives the teacher the opportunity to predict potential problems and therefore consider solutions;
• enhances teacher confidence as he is in control of a great proportion of classroom events;
• enables the teacher to have an in-depth and thorough understanding of the components of the syllabus.
Components of a lesson plan
A lesson plan format and content are usually determined by the features of a particular lesson (grammar, reading,
listening, etc). Nonetheless, a standards-based lesson plan would essentially include the following components:
• goals and rationale of the lesson [Succinctly describe the general rationale for teaching your lesson].
• Focus content area [Identify the one or two major skills/strategies, language items and
knowledge/information which you will target with your lesson].
• The standard (s) addressed [Identify the standards which your lesson addresses. Provide a brief
rationale explaining how your lesson addresses these standards].
• Teaching procedures [Identify the major steps/components of your lesson. Use this step of the lesson to
think through and plan the flow of your lesson].
• Assessment [How will you determine if your lesson achieved its goals? Include performance indicators
in your assessment plan].
The elements above can be used as a basis for drawing up a checklist for the evaluation of the outcomes.
Teachers are required to abide by two essential principles: variety and flexibility. Though they might design
detailed lesson plans, they often need to undertake a set of alterations to suit every class situation. Lesson plans
should also make provision for a variety of activities to sustain learners’ interest and motivation and to cater for
the different learner styles. The teacher should also be able to modify the plan when things go wrong.
Long- term planning
Lesson planning includes not only daily plans (lesson by lesson) but also other types of planning which
determine the overall flow for a series of lessons over several days, weeks or months. Unit planning is suitable
53
التوجيهات التربوية وبرامج تدريس مادة اللغة الإنجليزية س ت ث ت 2007