A Planning Poll
This is a brief poll. If you want please respond.
Do you have to turn in lesson plans prior on a weekly or daily basis?
When you write lesson plans, do you use a format that includes the objectives, initiation, activity, and assessment?
Would you prefer to write lesson plans based on what you accomplished the day before?
posted by Mr. McNamar @ 3:24 PM
16 Comments
16 Comments:
We must now submit unit plans which include detailed lesson plans. They must include an activating strategy, teaching activity, summarizing activity and assessment. We follow the "Learning Focus" or "Focused Learning" (title depends upon when you received your training)format. We must also keep a current portfolio accessible for administrative walk-throughs and observations. We must post our essential question and state standard being taught each day. Basically, we have lots of hoops...
I like writing my lesson plans on a weekly basis, with adjustments being made daily as needed. I do not like these Unit plans.
We are expected to write Instructional Plans for our courses that require a lot of pedagogical planning. These are good and require you to think through how you'll plan out your course unit-by-unit. We are asked to update administration weekly on how we're progressing through our IP.
Thankfully, actual day-to-day lesson plans need to be written out in such peda-gag-me detail. All of those buzz-word hoops can really get in the way of actual teaching.
I celebrate my retirement more intensely when I read sets of questions like this. I'm tempted to respond, "In the old days... ," but in the old days it was just as fruitlessly painful: the "Man" (regardless of gender) expected 8x10 color glossy pictures with a paragraph on the back of each one to be used as evidence against us.
I apologize for making that sound as if I retired while "Alice's Restaurant" was still available at BlockBuster - it's only been three years, but I can't believe administrators honestly believe that what you put on paper is more important than what you accomplish in the classroom. Actually, I don't think administrators believe that. I think administrators believe in covering their own backsides with paperwork rather than ensuring pedogogical excellence, and they're dedicated to making sure that teachers subscribe to the same meaningless fluff. They don't understand that anyone would stay in the classroom voluntarily when a sensible person would trade the hassle for more money in a cozy office with no kids.
I'm supposed to have submitted mine for the entire semester a month ago. All they wanted was the activities and state objectives day by day. I liked it much better when I had weekly plans that did include "focus" activities and "closure" and assessment, but would like submitting them after the fact even more--they might mean something then.
The whole thing is just more CYA busywork for the bigwigs who don't look at it but want to be able to say they have it.
I do my lesson plans one week early for only one reason: to get the papers I need into print shop, so they will be ready when I need them.
I don't write detailed notes at all. I think it's insane. I've been at this gig for 27 years.
I write the page, the general writing piece, PERHAPS the standard, if only to keep me focused.
That's it though. It makes me crazy watching people write objectives, etc. That's something we do in an effective university program.
Maybe that's the problem.
It boggles my mind that an educational blogger leaves no contact info on their blog. Sheesh
That's so weird Duck fans don't contact me.
We don't have to turn anything in, though rumblings have started. I have an objective in mind for each lesson, and the way I stay accountable is telling it to my students.
I often base the next day's lesson on what they need to improve (what didn't go right the prevous day), but I don't make each objective follow from the last one. It'll get covered again; they might just need a break to process whatever the subject is.
No submitting.....My plans are in huge binders with all sorts of notes, attachments, etc. Principals see my plans and run away very fast. I usually map out a unit in my plan book and choose various activities based on each particular group of kids....sometimes everyone in the room has something different. I generally keep the binder in one location and if I'm observed the adm. knows where it is and can take a gander at it. However, I often change things up from the written plan.
Like EHT I have the Many Binders O' Knowledge, available for any perusal. But, I do not have to turn in lesson plans of any sort. I often adjust on the fly as I teach, so detailed plans would be useless anyway. But I certainly know what I want to accomplish and think of at least two ways to do it.
I am blessed not to have to feel out that kind of paperwork, and I know it.
There's plenty of other paperwork to go around.
We turn in our lesson plans weekly - I say "we" because I collaborate with the other two 7th grade teachers in my school and we turn in one plan for the 3 of us. We have to put in our standards, objectives, and there's a code on there for Marzano's strategies. It's pretty painless and it's great having the whole week mapped out before we leave for the weekend.
Every day I post an agenda on the board, so students and I know what we're doing. No submitting, fortunately, as plans sometimes change depending on how much more or less we accomplish each day.
I try to plan my units with final objectives and assessments in mind, and work my way back from there, with each lesson (ideally) building or reinforcing a skill or competency.
I have a daily plan I keep online. Other than that I don't write out lessons in their entirety.
We are to post our lesson plans each week on the relatively new system which parents have access to. The plans are to include objectives, activities, and, in the comment field, what type of activity it was: lecture, small group, guided practice.
I don't mind this...it helps me focus for the upcoming week. My major problem is that the "objectives" are supposed to be our state's adopted objectives, and none have been adopted for what I teach...speech and drama. So I have to mine language arts, social studies, physical education, and national databases of theater objectives to post them.
We don't turn in any lesson plans, but are required to at least post the agenda on the board each day. Our periods are 90 minutes long. In my ideal world, I would post one week at a time, however I work with mildly mentally handicapped students and I never know how long anything is going to take.
Each day I jot notes to myself, based on how far we got the day before. That is the extent of my "lesson plan."
I do not have to turn in lesson plans on a daily or weekly basis, but I have had teaching jobs that did require me to do this prior to the one I currently have.
I actually no longer write daily plans, but I do write unit plans and tend to follow those plans. My classes begin with a warm-up type activity.
I might prefer to write plans based on what I accomplished the day before, but I do sketch out the week in my plan book so I have an idea where I'm going. Then I revise as things move more quickly or take more time.
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