Template for Technology-Enhanced Lesson Plans

Lesson Title:
(Please provide a descriptive title for your lesson plan)

Lesson Overview:
(Please provide a brief overview of the lesson plan that explains its content to the reader
in terms of topic focus, main activities and purpose)

Curriculum Subject(s) and subject Estimated Grade

area(s)/topic(s): duration: Level:
(Please refer to the curriculum subject(s)and/or subject (Please refer to
area(s)/topics that your lesson plan addresses) the estimated
length of the
lesson)

Curriculum Goal(s):
(Please state the national curriculum goal(s) or state educational standard(s) or industry
standards (if curriculum is for higher education or adult education) that your lesson plan
addresses. Do not forget to include the information and communication technology
standards that your lesson plan addresses.)

For each of your lessons (two minimal) include the following:

Lesson Objective(s):
(Please state in bulleted list format the primary and secondary objective(s) of your lesson
plan.)

National Educational Technology Standards for Students:

(Please state in bulleted the list format National Educational Technology Standards for
Students of your lesson plan -
http://www.iste.org/Content/NavigationMenu/NETS/ForStudents/2007Standards/NETS_fo
r_Students_2007.htm.)
Lesson Procedure:
(Please provide a detailed step-by-step description of how your lesson plan will be
implemented in order to achieve the lesson objectives by making particular reference to
the types of the following teaching and learning activities.) Use the technology
projects you created during the course.

Motivational – Preparatory activities:

Information presentation and information processing (analysis/synthesis) activities:

Application activities:

Closure/review activities:

Assessment/Evaluation:
(Please provide a clear description of the methods and/or techniques that will be used in
order to accurately determine whether or not students have mastered lesson objectives.)

Accommodations:
(Please include accommodations for this lesson for the following special needs
populations
• Students with Cognitive Difficulties
• Students with Physical Difficulties
• Students with Sensory Difficulties
• At-Risk Students
• Gifted and Talented Students)

Materials, resources and equipment:

(Pease indicate in bulleted list format all the materials, resources and equipment that
have been used or will be used for the implementation of the lesson plan.)
 Guidelines for the completion of eSTART
Lesson Plan template1

Curriculum Goals:
These are the general aims, goals or objectives that are often provided in national
curriculum guides, competency lists and/or content outlines that are set forth by the
government education departments, school districts, or organizations, industries, and
agencies. Usually, educators transform these general course goals, aims or objectives
into objectives for specific lessons.

Lesson Objectives:
What exactly do you want students to know or be able to do as a result of your
instruction? All lessons must have an aim, purpose or objective and the teacher must
be clear about this objective in order to get a successful learning outcome. Objectives
are important because they define the knowledge, skills and/or attitudes that students
should have acquired or developed at the end of the lesson.
On the other hand, it is important to keep in mind that apart from the primary learning
objectives, almost all lessons have secondary aims or objectives, e.g. the development
of listening, or writing skills, the development of social skills, the development of
technology skills, etc. As regards the composition of objectives it needs to be noted
that if the teacher follows the principles of the instructional design planning process,
then objectives should be composed in the form of behavioral or performance
objectives and should include three main components:
1. Performance: what the students will do to indicate that they have learned?
2. Conditions: what are the circumstances under which the students are expected
to perform?
3. Criteria: What are the standards that define acceptable performance?
Furthermore, in the case of behavioral or performance objectives, particular emphasis
needs to be given to the verbs used in the composition of objectives, so that these
refer to observable actions or observable pupil behaviors. Thus, it is preferable – if not
necessary - to use verbs like, compare, translate, describe, measure, identify, draw,
repair, explain, operate, adjust, compose, solve, etc. and at the same time avoid the
use of verbs like understand, think, know, recognize, become aware of, become
familiar with, appreciate, learn, etc. Following we provide some examples of
behavioral objectives:
− Example A: Given a webquest containing information about the American Civil
War, and working with a small group of peers, students will be able to create
either a story-telling Powerpoint presentation or a script for a play that : (1) is
at least 5 minutes long, (2) tells a story from the perspective of an assigned
character (southern soldier, northern woman, African American freeman, etc),
(3) uses historically accurate language and (4) refers to historically important
events.

1
The guidelines provided here are based on the following resources:
− Newby, T., Stepich, D., Lehman, J. and Russell, J. (2006) Educational Technology for Teaching
rd
and Learning(3 Edition). New Jersey: Pearson Education Inc.
− Johnson. A. (2000) It’s Time for Madeline Hunter to Go: A New Look at Lesson Plan Design. In
Action in Teacher Education, Vol. 22, No. 1, pp. 72-78
− The guidelines provided at the Educator’s Reference Desk website (Available at:
http://www.eduref.org/Virtual/Lessons/Guide.shtml)
 − Example B: Given a computer and a new software application, the students will
be able to install the software onto the hard drive, according to the procedure
described in the software manual.
− Example C: With the use of graphing calculators, students will be able to solve
simultaneous algebra equations. Solutions must be accurate to two decimal
places.
−
RadioJames Objectives Builder http://www.radiojames.com/ObjectivesBuilder/ is
online objective generator that may assist you with developing objectives.

National Educational Standards for Students: ISTE's National Educational

Technology Standards for Students (2007) help students prepare to work, live, and
contribute to the social and civic fabric of their communities. The standards identify
several higher-order thinking skills and digital citizenship as critical for students to
learn effectively for a lifetime and live productively in our emerging global society. To
identify appropriate technologies and legitimize their use, it becomes important to
state the NETS addressed within the instructional units. The standards can be found
at
http://www.iste.org/Content/NavigationMenu/NETS/ForStudents/2007Standards/NETS
_for_Students_2007.htm

Lesson Procedure: This is usually a detailed step by step description of everything a

teacher will do from the moment he/she will start the lesson till the moment he/she
will finish it, and includes information about the implementation of all lesson activities
with particular reference to the teaching methods or formats used (e.g. creative
writing, demonstration, simulation, discussion, role-playing, graphing, problem solving,
games, analogies, case-studies, experiments, constructions, drama, etc), to the class
layout, organization and grouping of students (e.g. individual, small-groups, large-
groups, etc), to the guided and independent practice opportunities given before
assessment/evaluation, to the corrective feedback provided, to the materials and
resources used, etc.

In general terms, a lesson procedure can be divided in phases (e.g. lesson

introduction, main lesson body and lesson closure) and can be described as a
collection of instructional activities, which are being implemented in a logical,
systematic and sequenced order. Each of the lesson phases and each type of
instructional activity serves a particular purpose. Thus, as regards the lesson phases:

• The main purpose of introductory – preparatory activities is to introduce students

to the concepts or ideas found in the lesson, alias to review what has been learned
so far and is relevant to the lesson, to link new ideas to known ideas, to state
lesson objectives, to arouse curiosity, create interest and in general motivate
students and get them focused on the lesson.

• The main lesson body is usually consisted by a variety of information presentation,

information processing and application activities, which serve the purposes of
presenting learners new information, concepts, skills and ideas, involving them in
the processes of manipulating, organizing, analyzing and synthesizing the new
information, concepts and ideas and providing plenty of differentiated
 opportunities for practicing and/or applying these new concepts, skills, ideas and
information into a variety of situations.

• Finally, the purpose of the lesson closure – review activities is to review the key
points of the lesson or the main ideas covered in a lesson and provide a preview of
the next learning experience.

As regards the purposes of different types of instructional activities, it is important to

remember that each activity should be responsive to a set of key questions:

Motivation and orientation activities: The purpose of motivating activities is to gain

student’s attention and maintain it throughout the lesson, while the purpose of
orientation activities is to help students see what they have previously learned, what
they are currently learning and what they will subsequently learn. Even though both of
these types of activities are mainly used in the beginning and the end of the lesson, it
is important to add that students need to be motivated throughout the learning
process and that smooth transitions are needed in order to move from one part of
lesson to the next. Key questions in which motivation and orientation activities should
be responsive:
• What will you do at the beginning of the lesson to gain students’ attention?
• At what points in the lesson will it be useful to build student motivation?
• What can you do throughout the lesson to increase each aspect of motivation,
alias attention, relevance, confidence and satisfaction?
• What will you do to help students understand the objectives of the current lesson?
• What will you do to link the lesson to previous lessons?
• What will you do to provide smooth transitions within the lesson activities?
• What will you do to summarize the lesson and link it to future lessons?

Information presentation and processing activities: All learning requires some sort of
information delivery or information presentation. Discovery or inquiry learning is not
an excuse for learning - by - guessing exercises. Information activities are typically
used in the main lesson phase for presenting new ideas to students (facts, concepts,
principles, procedures, etc) and for helping students understand and remember these
new ideas. Key questions in which information activities should be responsive:
What major content ideas will you present? In what sequence? Using which examples?
• What will you do and what techniques will you use to help students understand
and remember those ideas?
• What will you do to help students see the relationships among the ideas?
• What will you do to help students understand when and why the ideas will be
useful?

Application activities: Application activities involve practice, guidance and feedback.

Key questions in which application activities should be responsive:
What will you do to give students opportunities to practice using their new knowledge
or skill?
• At what points will you build those opportunities into the lesson?
• How much guidance will you provide and what form will that guidance take?
• What will you do to give students both reinforcing and corrective feedback about
their performance during the practices?
Assessment/ Evaluation: What will you do to determine whether students have
achieved the learning objectives? How will you give students feedback about their
performance during and after the evaluation? Evaluation refers to the process of
gathering information about what students have learned and describe a variety of
techniques that can be used before, during and after instruction. Thus, you may
gather students’ work and assess this work by using some kind of grading rubric that
is based on lesson objectives, replicate some of the application activities practiced as
part of the lesson without providing the same level of guidance as during the lesson or
you can devise and administer a quiz or a test.

Accommodations: How will make adaptations to enable all individuals to gain

knowledge, skills, and enthusiasm for learning your content? What technologies will
you use to support learning and reduce barriers to the curriculum while maintaining
high achievement standards for all (http://www.cast.org/)?

Materials, resources and equipment: What materials, books, resources and

equipment will be needed in carrying out the lesson plan? What needs to prepared in
advance? A complete list of materials, including full citations of textbooks or other
copyrighted resources, worksheets, handouts, software, hardware, web links or any
other special media considerations are most useful for the readers.