Lesson plan in language teaching

1. TEACHER TRAINING WORKSHOPS
Module 1: Methodology
“Lesson Planning”
© English Highway Language Center 2012

2. Principles of Communicative Teaching

3. TASK 1: Answer the following questions and discuss your
answers with your peer
1. Why is lesson planning important?
2. How is lesson planning important for the teacher? for the learners?
3. What do you take into account when you design a lesson plan?
4. What constant components are there in your lesson plan?

4. 1. Why is lesson planning important?
 Being clear on what you want to teach
 Being ready to cope with whatever happens
 Give your teaching a framework, an overall shape
 A reminder for the teacher when they get distracted
 It suggests a level of professionalism and real
commitment.

5. 2. How is lesson planning important for the teacher
and the learner?
Teachers
 They don’t have to think on their feet.
 They don’t lose face in front of their
learners.
 They are clear on the procedure to
follow.
 They build on previous teaching and
prepare for coming lessons
Learners
 They realize that the teacher cares
for their learning.
 They attend a structured lesson:
easier to assimilate
 They appreciate their teacher’s work
as a model of well-organized work
to imitate.

6. 3. What do you take into account when you design a
lesson plan?
Balance
Flexibility
Variety
Challenge
Coherence

7. Variety
Why vary?
 to meet different learning styles
 to consider different intelligence types
 to keep learners interested and avoid monotony
What to vary?
 Contents
 Activities
 Interaction modes
 Materials
 Aids …

8. Ways of Varying these different components
1. Tempo/Pace : Activities may be brisk and fast-moving,
such as guessing games; or slow and reflective, such as
reading or responding in writing.
2. Mode : The learners may work on their own at
individualized tasks, or in pairs or groups, or as a full class
in interaction with the teacher.
3. Mode and Skill : Activities may be based on the written
or the spoken language; and within these, they may vary as
to whether the learners are asked to produce (speak/ write)
or receive (listen / read ).

9. 4. Difficulty : Activities may be seen as easy and non demanding; or
difficult , requiring concentration and effort.
5. Mood : Activities vary also in mood: light and fun -based versus serious
and profound; happy versus sad; tense versus relaxed.
5. Stir - Settle : Some activities enliven and excite learners ( such as
controversial discussions for advanced levels), or activities which involve
physical movement (such as the race dictation) for the lower levels.
Others, like dictation, have the effect of calming them down
6. Active - Passive : Learners may be activated in a way that encourages
their own initiative ; or they may only be required to do as they are told

10. COHERENCE
 Observe a logical pattern to the lesson: there has to
be connection between the different activities in the
lesson
 Smooth transition is one of the pillars that ensures
success of the lesson plan during implementation in
the classroom
 An activity in a lesson builds on a previous one and
prepares for the next

11. Challenge
 Learners are intelligent human beings and come to
class with knowledge previously acquired.
 The new lesson should add to that knowledge
without excess.
 The lesson that does not challenge is a lesson that
does not motivate.
 No learning happens if the lesson doesn’t present
new items beyond students’ prior knowledge.

12. Flexibility
Two dimensions:
 ability to use a number of different techniques and
not be a slave to one methodology– Principled
eclecticism.
 ability to change the plan if it shows inappropriacy
to the classroom real situation for a reason or another.

13. Balance
The lesson is a mixture of a number of ingredients:
techniques, activities and contents. The successful
teacher is the one who is able to observe the right
dosage and make the learners enjoy a savoury
lesson.

14. What do you take into account?
 Objectives set out to be achieved
 Prior knowledge of learners
 Materials and didactic auxiliaries to be used
 Tasks and activities to select and students’grouping patterns
 Interaction modes
 Timing and time management

15. COMPONENTS OF A LESSON PLAN
LEARNERS:

16. Continued …
OBJECTIVES

17. Continued …
PROCEDURE

18. Continued …
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