Creating An Engaging Lesson Plan

For a teacher, having an effective lesson plan in place is the ticket to reaching students, especially those who might otherwise not be engaged in a particular subject. The sense of fulfillment that the teaching profession is meant to achieve is enhanced when that plan lays the groundwork for such students to take it upon themselves to learn more about a topic.

Listed below are some ideas for lesson plans that can get through to students the particular importance of a topic. While some may scoff at the idea of using educational games to get a message across, past experiences show that they can work:

Going Beyond Lectures

While verbal instruction has been a hallmark of teaching forever, adapting to the era of the mobile device can do wonders in reaching contemporary students. That's because it provides an atmosphere where videos and interactive contest become part of the curriculum, allowing them to stay focused rather than simply listening to you talk.

One Size Does Not Fit All

Expecting students to learn on their own at a pace that you set can essentially lead to a system in which some students thrive while others fail miserably. Designing group learning topics to explore deeper issues when it comes to such things as history or US civics puts the onus on all members of that group to do their part and promotes teamwork in general.

Games People Play

A relatively dry topic like US civics might elicit plenty of yawns from students, but using educational games to deliver the right information can stifle such actions. One example is PolitiCraft, which allows the student to have a choice in what type of civic engagement they prefer and gets them to use their own creativity in fashioning solutions.

Digital Storytelling

Designing lesson plans when it comes to writing can often be difficult because some students take to standard instruction right away while others simply can't grasp the concepts of this necessary concept. However, through an idea like digital storytelling, a student's writing abilities can grow by using software that turns their efforts into video representations. That something that forces the student to concentrate more in order to get their point across.

Pinpointing Objectives

A teacher's lesson plan is something that a student now often sees in a general way, with nebulous expectations potentially leading to short attention spans toward a subsequent topic at hand. Presenting one that's fairly specific, while allowing for some wiggle room on the part of the teacher, gives the latter a certain level of flexibility. By the same token, students can get a better sense of the concepts that are most important. 

Civics Taught Right

New technologies, educational games and other key components are often part of lesson plans that reach their intended target, the student. In the area of US civics, PolitiCraft is something that can light a fire under those students that can aid them long after they leave the classroom.

Civic engagement is something that's learned, yet too often, such knowledge comes in piecemeal fashion or from the wrong sources. Using PolitiCraft can avoid that trouble, so go to www.politicraft.org to make sure your students learn something important while also having fun.

Rachel Lyle