Having an organized lesson plan prior to the onset of the class can prepare you to deliver the material efficiently, meet timelines, and keep students engaged for the duration of the lesson.
Preparation is key, an outline on how the day should go gives he student an idea of what's to come. So I like to take from this structure, knowing your stundents, ice breakers and engaging.
Great ideas about time management, using various resources to engage the students throughout the class period, encouraging use of other resources besides the text and assessing what the students already know at the outset so you can build from there.
Not all lessons will finish on time, so plan ahead and prepare activities/content for when lessons end earlier than expected.
Your first step should be a fact finding mission. What do your students already know?
I have been toying with the idea of pre-tests. Seems like a good idea to start now.
Have extra materials incase your lecture is to fast and need to have something to carry out the time.
I will look at ways to change my pre-test to ensure what level they are at.
Ensure that you have additional material to use if class goes too quickly & remember to start where you left off if you can't finished as planned.
Know yourself
Use variety in resources and Assessment strategies.
Lessons plans should guide and inform your instruction. At my last school, when I was new to teaching and inexperienced, lesson plans were created AFTER the class as a way to show what was taught. That never made sense to me and was only busy work. Lesson plans need to be created prior to class and should be a map and a guide.
I learned that I need to get to know my students better to be a more effective instructor. I also have a strategy to account for time compression. I have three types of information that I deliver to students on a specific topic; Need to know, should know, and nice to know. Need to know information is the most important, and is the whole purpose for the lesson. If I need to fill in time, I go to things that are not neccesary but related. And if I still need to fill in time, I go with the items that are nice to know about the topic.
I've learned that it can benefit me in the classroom to get to know the student. Knowledge of the students can help me better prepare in the details of the content I am teaching, how much time needs to be spent of a specific topic, and how I can utilize the more advanced student to help with the instruction to other students.
Get to know your students, connect. Gain an understanding of their knowledge base. Remember to create contingencies before hand for classes that end up needing more or less content.
Although flexibility is important for an instructor, the most important resource is the WHY. Finding out why the student is taking the course will give you an idea where they are in the learning scape.
Take time to know your strengths and weaknesses to allow yourself time to know what your lesson plan will be.
Be ready and prepared to teach
Understanding your environment and students will play a great role in your teaching. Dependent on what the students backgrounds are and their capability will help plan for a successful course. Especially during the COVID times, we, as instructors, need to know and understand the students capabilities within themselves and their technology, to understand how to adapt and teach as needed in order to be successful.
Its important to get to know students during course preparation. This will allow the instructor to adjust lesson plans as needed.
I learned that getting to know your students helps with lesson planning. I plan to utilize some of the questions to ask in order to know the students background and gain insight into what they alreasy know. I was doing this before, but did not know how important it was in lesson planning.
Plan for time compression.
