How to Make an English Lesson Plan

A lesson plan is a blueprint or map that teachers use to carry out the objective for the lesson. Although different school districts may prefer varying methods of writing the plan, there are several generally accepted fundamental rules that apply. Writing an English lesson plan for high school students focusing on grammar and writing can be achieved by following the suggested format.

Write the aim of the lesson you are going to present on the blackboard. Realize that a general broad topic is not practical. State a specific objective. Focus, for example, on teaching the high school English class about run-on sentences in conjunction with a story writing assignment.

Determine how you can motivate the class to be interested in learning what you are going to teach. Write this in your plan. Provide a challenge for the students. Put a humorous run-on sentence on the board. Ask the students why they should change this error. Try to elicit responses such as, "It's awkward. It distorts meaning." Emphasize the need to correct this error so that students will want to do so in their work.

Include in your plan specific procedures and activities to realize your objective. Review old materials and add new ones. Develop the concepts and provide for practice. Ask yourself what activities you can use to develop the aim and list them in the plan. Distribute a hand-out with 10 examples of run-on sentences, preferably from previous written work, and have the students correct the first five on the list. Add to this a written assignment whereby the students write two or three paragraphs on "The Funniest Experience I Ever Had." Exchange papers and have students look to see if there are run-on sentences. Return papers to the writers.

Provide for follow-up activities and include them in your lesson plan. Think of a method to reinforce your lesson concepts. Instruct the students to complete the worksheet on run-on sentences for homework and revise the paragraphs written in class. Plan to review these in the next lesson.

Evaluate the lesson. Ask yourself if your students reached the objective and learned what was expected. Check the homework assignment and give a weekly quiz on the grammatical principles you taught.