Lesson Plan - Part 1: Essential? Important? Burden? Waste of time?

Lesson Plan, or known as LP in my previous school, is something that every teacher is familiar with. No day of teaching can pass by without mentioning the word "Lesson Plan."

I was introduced to this when I did a semester of student teaching in a New York City Public School. Back then, it meant sitting down with an academic calendar in front of you, scribbling down some notes here and there in your planner, and flipping through some textbooks hoping to find appropriate activities for your class. Knowing what you'll be doing with the kids is very important.

The next time I encountered the concept of Lesson Planning was during a teacher training program in New York. Then I learned that there are a gazillion ways of creating a lesson plan. Basically choose a template that you're comfortable with and use it to guide you through the day or week, so long as you have the same components: objectives of the lesson, materials/tools, procedures, means of assessment and reflection. Be prepared!


When faced by the real stuff in a classroom, it turned out that it wasn't always necessary to sit down every week and write down every single detail of your lessons of the week on a paper called "Lesson Plan Form." What I got most out of my first year of teaching was that it was important to be well prepared and flexible--reflect on what you did well/poorly the week before, plan for the week based on the students' progress, and project for the following week. Understand what you did, do, and will do well...

It came to my understanding that planning a lesson should become a second nature to every teacher. So it's not asking for much, basically just like anything else you do in life, you plan ahead and prepare for the worst.

In my previous school, however, people seem to dread the whole idea of making a lesson plan. It's a burden to some, and a waste of time for others. Not long after, I became one of those people who despise lesson planning. Writing a lesson plan became another administrative work that teachers have to do, instead of it being a necessary tool to help them perform better in class. On top of that, the quantity and the date of submission of lesson plans become the focus and a criteria of how good of teacher you are, instead of the quality of the lesson plan and moreover the execution of the lesson plans.

Despite loathing the "duty" of making a lesson plan, I know for a fact that most teachers in my school plan, and they sure plan well, whether it's all well written on a formulated lesson plan form, or on a piece of paper attached to their planner. It didn't matter to me that much the shape and look of your lesson plan, so long as "you've done your job and are accountable for it." That what matters the most to me as a newbie in the world of school administrative.
Am I right or am I delusional?


Now that I'm not teaching in a formal classroom setting, the burden of lesson planning is different. But even as tutors, we were asked to plan our lessons SMARTly--Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time Bound.

Teaching a class of 28 kids versus a group of three is no different when it comes to creating a lesson plan because you still have to think of the objectives, execution plans, and outcome. Is it complicated? Sure is! But it's a must for the sake of your students, so do it or... you don't wanna know...