How (Not) to Create a Lesson Plan

Cooking Club

“Education is simply the soul of a society as it passes from one generation to another.”  – G.K. Chesterton

This semester I am teaching one hundred and ninety seven college students in China. That is a lot of planning. As a new teacher in the Peace Corps I think it’s important to think of the human mind as a seed ready to be plant–  Ah whatever. Here’s how to really create a lesson in style.


You will need:

Spare time

Unbending willpower

2 tsp. Canola oil


Step 1 Get on YouTube

man-surfing-internet-on-laptop-and-smiling-xs

In order to create an immersive lesson for your students you need to get onto the Internet. In our digital age the average attention span of an adult person, including that of your students, is less than a goldfishes. That comes out to be about eight seconds. But don’t worry! YouTube is ripe with content that will transform your future lesson from drab into dazzle.


Step 2 Get Your Head in the Game

008b6b1c0a552d72064ee573ce8f82e8

You need to pump yourself up if you are ever going to be able to think of a good warm-up activity for tomorrow’s class. Since you are on YouTube already, go ahead and watch two or three of your favorite music videos to get some inspiration. It might be worth it to create a playlist that you can listen to later on.

An example of a good starter video:


Step 3 Open Microsoft Word

You can’t paint the Mona Lisa without a canvas.


Step 4 Take a Break

Pacing yourself is important here. Even Arnold Schwarzenegger took a break between Terminator movies and he was eventually elected to be the governor of California.

I’ll be back… after a cigar


Slow and Steady

Step 5 Create a Template

Don’t think about the lesson quite yet. Work on perfecting the structure first. Will the students do a skit? Will there be a Part I and then a Part II? What will the temperature in the classroom be?

There are many questions to consider when thinking of a good lesson. Who is your audience? Will you need to do a review of the previous class? How much time should be allotted for–


Step 6 Clear Your Head

Whew. That was getting to be a lot. You should go get some fresh air. Go for a walk outside so that you can return refreshed and ready to weave another hem into that golden tapestry of knowledge to be draped on your students tomorrow.

Fresh air is good for your immune system. Remember, tomorrow you will be cramped in a small classroom with fifty students for two hours. You should take that twilight walk near the large ferris wheel in your Peace Corps town.

it’s not creepy if you don’t think about it

But wait… what’s that rustling in the bushes?!


Step 7 Try to Fight a Bear

Maybe you should get some sleep. You’re not going to get anything done tonight.


Step 8 Remember the PPP Format

62542914

When in circumstances of extreme lack of motivation, think back to Pre Service Training and the PPP format.

A PPP Education

When it comes to Teaching English as a Foreign Language, the PPP is what you NeNeNeed. It is an instructional model designed to increase the amount of time students spend speaking compared to you, the teacher.

1) Presentation – introduction of content and language

2) Practice – students begin to work with language

3) Production – students internalize and use language

The theory is that a teacher tells students new content, practices it with them and then has them do something creative with it. The goal is 80% student talk, 20% teacher talk. Boiled down, this design is good for people who need to practice speaking a new language.

As a matter of principle, I like to add another P to this format:

Procrastination – somebody needs to put the ‘pro’ in procrastinate

Personally, I place procrastination previous to presentation. This way I am assured to wait until the last minute, write a blog post and then get down to work on a lesson plan for tomorrow.


Originally posted on an old blog.

My Peace Corps timeline of service.

56 Replies to “How (Not) to Create a Lesson Plan”

  1. Exceptional post however , I was wanting to know if you could write a litte more on this subject? I’d be very thankful if you could elaborate a little bit more. Bless you!

  2. Utterly written articles, appreciate it for entropy. “He who establishes his argument by noise and command shows that his reason is weak.” by Michel de Montaigne.

  3. naturally like your web-site but you have to check the spelling on quite a few of your posts. A number of them are rife with spelling problems and I find it very troublesome to inform the reality then again I?¦ll surely come back again.

  4. Thank you for sharing excellent informations. Your site is very cool. I am impressed by the details that you have on this blog. It reveals how nicely you perceive this subject. Bookmarked this website page, will come back for extra articles. You, my pal, ROCK! I found simply the info I already searched all over the place and just couldn’t come across. What a perfect web-site.

  5. Wow, fantastic blog structure! How lengthy have you been running a blog for? you made running a blog glance easy. The whole glance of your site is excellent, let alone the content material!

  6. I like this web site very much, Its a rattling nice post to read and obtain information. “I’d better get off the phone now, I’ve already told you more than I heard myself.” by Loretta Lockhorn.

  7. Hi there! I just wanted to ask if you ever have any trouble with hackers? My last blog (wordpress) was hacked and I ended up losing several weeks of hard work due to no data backup. Do you have any methods to stop hackers?

  8. You actually make it appear so easy with your presentation but I to find this topic to be really one thing which I believe I might never understand. It sort of feels too complicated and extremely vast for me. I am looking ahead on your next publish, I’ll attempt to get the dangle of it!

  9. Im no longer sure where you’re getting your information, however great topic. I needs to spend a while finding out more or figuring out more. Thanks for wonderful info I used to be on the lookout for this info for my mission.

  10. Definitely believe that that you said. Your favorite justification seemed to be at the internet the easiest factor to take into accout of. I say to you, I definitely get annoyed whilst other folks consider issues that they just don’t realize about. You managed to hit the nail upon the top and also defined out the whole thing with no need side effect , other folks could take a signal. Will likely be back to get more. Thanks

  11. The gill respiratory pavement cells represent more than 80 of the teleost branchial epithelium 21, 30 buy cialis online forum Furthermore, we demonstrate that younger patients were more likely to have lower adherence, whereas the patients tumour stage and status of ER are also significantly associated with adherence behaviour

  12. I?¦ve been exploring for a little for any high-quality articles or weblog posts in this sort of area . Exploring in Yahoo I eventually stumbled upon this web site. Reading this information So i?¦m satisfied to convey that I have an incredibly good uncanny feeling I discovered exactly what I needed. I so much surely will make sure to don?¦t omit this site and provides it a glance on a relentless basis.

  13. I have been surfing on-line greater than three hours as of late, but I by no means found any attention-grabbing article like yours. It¦s pretty value enough for me. In my view, if all website owners and bloggers made excellent content material as you probably did, the web will be a lot more helpful than ever before.

  14. hi!,I like your writing very much! percentage we keep up a correspondence extra approximately your article on AOL? I need a specialist on this area to unravel my problem. Maybe that’s you! Looking ahead to look you.

  15. Woah! I’m really enjoying the template/theme of this site. It’s simple, yet effective. A lot of times it’s very difficult to get that “perfect balance” between superb usability and visual appearance. I must say you’ve done a very good job with this. Additionally, the blog loads super quick for me on Internet explorer. Outstanding Blog!

  16. A powerful share, I just given this onto a colleague who was doing slightly analysis on this. And he in reality bought me breakfast as a result of I discovered it for him.. smile. So let me reword that: Thnx for the treat! However yeah Thnkx for spending the time to debate this, I feel strongly about it and love reading extra on this topic. If doable, as you turn into experience, would you thoughts updating your blog with more details? It is extremely useful for me. Large thumb up for this blog post!

  17. An interesting discussion is worth comment. I think that you should write more on this topic, it might not be a taboo subject but generally people are not enough to speak on such topics. To the next. Cheers

  18. Wonderful blog! I found it while searching on Yahoo News. Do you have any tips on how to get listed in Yahoo News? I’ve been trying for a while but I never seem to get there! Appreciate it

  19. Hi! I know this is kinda off topic however I’d figured I’d ask. Would you be interested in exchanging links or maybe guest writing a blog post or vice-versa? My site covers a lot of the same topics as yours and I believe we could greatly benefit from each other. If you might be interested feel free to send me an email. I look forward to hearing from you! Superb blog by the way!

  20. The next time I read a blog, I hope that it doesnt disappoint me as much as this one. I mean, I know it was my choice to read, but I actually thought youd have something interesting to say. All I hear is a bunch of whining about something that you could fix if you werent too busy looking for attention.

  21. Good write-up, I’m regular visitor of one’s blog, maintain up the nice operate, and It’s going to be a regular visitor for a lengthy time.

  22. I loved as much as you’ll receive carried out right here. The sketch is attractive, your authored material stylish. nonetheless, you command get got an impatience over that you wish be delivering the following. unwell unquestionably come more formerly again since exactly the same nearly a lot often inside case you shield this increase.

  23. That is the correct weblog for anybody who desires to search out out about this topic. You notice a lot its almost arduous to argue with you (not that I actually would need…HaHa). You positively put a brand new spin on a subject thats been written about for years. Nice stuff, simply great!

  24. You made some respectable points there. I looked on the web for the difficulty and located most individuals will go together with together with your website.

  25. Hi, I think your site might be having browser compatibility issues. When I look at your website in Safari, it looks fine but when opening in Internet Explorer, it has some overlapping. I just wanted to give you a quick heads up! Other then that, fantastic blog!

  26. Sight Care is a visual wellness supplement that is currently available in the market. According to the Sight Care makers, it is efficient and effective in supporting your natural vision

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *