The middle portion of chapter 6 is all about writing the lesson plans. The author explains that writing lessons is a skill that takes time to develop and perfect over the years. They also stressed the importance of writing lessons down and having extra activities in mind.
As a middle school teacher, I see many benefits to having hard copies of my lesson plans. Lesson plans should have step by step procedures so you always have a guide to follow while teaching. I am in my novice teaching right now and one thing I have learned is that you have to be able to go with the flow. In one of my math lessons, I found out right before I began teaching that we had added computer lab time to practice PARCC testing. So, I had less time than what I had originally thought. When the computer lab time came, I was able to mark in my lesson plan where we stopped, so on Monday, I could pick up right where we left off.
Another thing I want to take away from this chapter is that with my first few years of teaching middle school, I will not have a good idea of how much time my lessons will take because I will not have taught them yet. By writing out a lesson plan and listing "if time remains" at the bottom with a few more activities, I won't have to worry about getting done with a lesson early and not knowing what to do.
Thanks Emma:)
ReplyDeleteI like what you said about an "if time remains" section in your lesson plans. It helps you prioritize, and it also helps keep the students busy and time structured. I also think that as you said, a first year teacher has no idea how much time any given activity is going to take. It also may depend on the class attitude how much time certain plans will take.
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