On lesson planning

I've been thinking a lot about lesson planning lately.  I planned my first lesson last week.  I've taught several before, as a student teacher and as a substitute, but this is the first time I've planned a lesson.  The lesson went well enough, but I don't feel like I planned it properly.  I'm not sure if that's because I didn't (probably) or because I felt like it should have been something "more" or "more complex" than what it was.

My mentor sent me his lesson plan template, but it didn't work properly on my computer.  He has a template that has all of the Common Core elements listed in a drop-down box and many essential questions to choose from.  It looked easy-peasy on his computer, but didn't work on my Linux machine.   So instead I turned to the UVEI lesson template, but that didn't make a lot of sense to me either.

I ended up using my mentor's outline, without linking Common Core and just taking a guess at other elements.  My focus was on the step-by-step outline of the lesson because that is the part that made the most sense to me.  That was what I could wrap my head around and felt confident moving forward.

I drafted two versions, each going in slightly different directions, and sent them to my mentor.  He wrote back suggesting version A with a select few elements from version B as well.  We discussed and I moved forward to a "final draft."  I say that with quotes because I don't know if you ever have a truly final draft.  Does it count as final if the lesson changes a bit in progress?

My lesson was on a maps and was to be taught to one of the reading groups.  The lesson, as I had written it and as I had it in my head, was an introduction to maps and a discussion of the common elements found on a map.  When I discussed it with my mentor one final time, on the morning of the lesson, he made a comment about how the EQ should be along the lines of "How do maps help you to better understand what you're reading?"  That made sense, of course, since this is a reading group.  However, the EQ I had settled on, after working through my step-by-step lesson plan, was "What are the four key elements on a map?"  Not quite the same thing!

I taught the lesson, including the topics and activities I had planned, but modifying it on the fly to address how maps help you understand what you're reading, and then forgot the EQ at the end of the lesson anyway!  Oops!  My mentor jumped in at the end to wrap it up and bring it back to the essential question, "How to maps help you better understand what you're reading."

Overall I think the lesson was ok.  My mentor did a brief check-in at the next day's lesson, tying a map into his plan and asking the students how it helped them understand the text.  They seemed to get it.

However, a big lesson learned here is that it's important to start with that essential question!  It's important to keep in mind who you are teaching to and what you are teaching.  This was a reading lesson, after all, not a social studies lesson. 

Despite the hard work I put into this lesson plan, I still very much feel like I stumbled through it.  I'm looking forward to our upcoming UVEI session on lesson planning.  I have a few solo teaching days coming up and I'll need to do the lesson planning for them.  I hope to be a little more comfortable and confident in my planning abilities before then!