Objectives for lesson plans

Teaching is a decision-making process, perhaps particularly so at the planning and preparation stage. The ability to make the right decisions depends on many factors, including not only knowledge but also experience and judgement as to which decisions are relatively unimportant and can be made quickly.

As trainers, we would probably consider the content of a lesson plan to be of more importance than the way in which it was set out. Yet these trainees' overwhelming concern was in fact with the form of the plan rather than its substance. In the question shown in Figure 1, 98 per сent of these trainees, for example, allocated 5 points (i.e. a great deal of concern) to the items d, e, and f. The other choices, and the percentage of students allocating 5 points, are given in Figure 1.

FIGURE I

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Q. How much concern did the following aspects of writing your lesson plans cause you?

Answer on a scale from 'very little' (1) to 'a great deal' (5)

a. Selection of aims and objectives

b. Choice of activities

с Allocation of time to task

d. Deciding on a format

e. Amount of detail to put in

f. Making it look good

g. Making it easy for me to use

h. Organization of headings and subheadings

Percentage allocating 5 points to choices a-h
a 85% b 35% с 45%

d 95% e 95% f 90%

g 18% h 65%

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As trainers, we had adopted an approach which attempted to focus on a lesson plan as a statement of each teacher's individual objectives and intended strategies. The important issue is what they are, not how they are set out on a page. But trainees worried over these surface manifestations, and the anxiety deflected them from the plan itself.

In addition, deciding on objectives for their lesson plans was universally difficult—though often they were not short of ideas on what the lesson itself would consist of. It was easy for them to decide on activities or tasks, but much more difficult to work out exactly What the learning outcomes of these tasks were supposed to be as expressed in aims and objectives. In many cases, trainees would work backwards, choosing what they thought would be a 'good' interactive activity and then seeing what kind of aims and objectives they could derive from it. In other cases, they said they used textbook chapter headings, or specified such a vague objective that it would fit every occasion (e.g. Obj: 'To be able to read a text'). The number of objectives was also a cause for trainee concern with all the students saying it was hard to find 'enough'. The difficulty with formulating objectives is more serious perhaps than the problems students had with the surface features of a lesson plan because it suggests that for inexperienced teachers the reason behind many language activities and tasks is not always very clear. However, the difficulties these trainees had with formulating aims and objectives are not unusual. John (1991), writing about teachers of Maths and Geography in the UK, shows that neither novice teachers nor experienced teachers planned lessons according to the traditional rational model with its emphasis on aims and objectives.

Yet the context of a teaching practice generally demands this of them, thus adding to their problems as decision makers. For trainees, or even novice teachers, few decisions at the pre-lesson stage are automatic: the trainees' lack of experience and knowledge mean that what might seem straightforward decisions to trainers, are problematic to the trainee faced with the competing expectations of the school, the pupils, and the supervising tutors. As trainers, we need to create a delicate balance between taking minor decisions out of the trainees' hands—by, for example, setting out explicitly a pro-forma lesson plan, giving clearly written objectives for tasks, and so on—and yet allowing trainees to develop their own strategies which harmonize with their teaching situation.

Part of the preparation is deciding what materials will be used for any task or activity. The question below received a 100 per cent positive response.

Answer on a scale from 'disagree' (1) to 'strongly agree' (5)

It was very hard to find enough materials for a lesson other than a textbook.

(100 per cent answered 'strongly agree')

It was not the writing of materials that proved problematic for many trainees, but rather the finding of materials other than a textbook. On further discussion it emerged that even where they felt the book was adequate, they did not 'dare' use it alone. Being a 'good' teacher, they felt, meant providing interesting and stimulating materials outside the book. This was something that we had obviously signaled, if not explicitly advised. Questions asked of trainees during training, such as 'is the material lively and interesting?', may give the impression that a lesson stands or falls by the quality of the materials. The way in which method classes are implemented can also convey messages about what is valued by trainers in teaching. Thus, these students at an early stage in their teaching career were spending too much preparation time trying to amass supportive materials, when in reality it would have been better to have given more thought and time not only to using the book competently but also to the classroom activities themselves. In fact, many trainees chose activities not from a position of conviction concerning their efficacy but rather because they wanted to 'please the supervisor'. Training courses may claim to want to encourage trainees to develop their own theories of professional action through, for example, experimental learning, but for young trainees it may be preferable if, as trainers, we make explicit our own philosophies and beliefs.

One of the areas we were particularly concerned to investigate was that of student self-evaluation. In addition to questions asked of the trainees, and their own written lesson evaluations, supervisors were also asked for confidential comments on how trainees coped with this area. Most teacher training courses are concerned with self-evaluation because as Calderhead (1989) says 'reflective teaching is generally understood to concern more than the cognition involved in teaching; it concerns metacognitive processes of comparison, evaluation, and self-direction'. So we get trainees to reflect upon their own performance because teacher training is ultimately about the development of professional knowledge and understanding. It is hoped that students will not only acquire effective teaching skills, but also that they will develop professional autonomy through an emphasis on an analysis of their teaching experience. Trainees' responses to questions in this area revealed two issues which need to be addressed. Firstly, the kind of self-evaluation that they seemed to want and need may not agree with our desire for them to become professionally reflective. Secondly, there was a very wide gap between how trainees saw their own performance and how observers saw it.

Some writers have suggested that trainees can be helped to self-reflect more effectively if the process is structured in some way: for example, Williams (1989) suggests students choosing a focus area prior to the lesson; Thornbury (1991) discusses the keeping of structured logs as a means of developing 'craft knowledge'. However, these trainees were universal in their dislike of such 'forms', seeing them as yet another thing to be 'done'. What they did find valuable, however, was the opportunity to express their feelings in an unstructured way. When they did this, their evaluations were more descriptive and affective than analytic, and concerned more with the failings of the pupils than pedagogic aspects. They revealed the often defensive feelings of young teacher trainees, for example:

1 Some of the students were not even interested in the lesson. So when I spoke they lost interest. Some of them even think of school as a place to gather and meet friends and chat!

2 There are boys who are just not interested. I try to attract their attention but they don't bother. In fact, they just show their sour faces to me. This is why they have such a poor command of English.

3 The major problem is that 60 per cent of the students are too lazy to bother about learning English. Some of the students were disturbing their friends. I managed to keep them quiet by threatening that I would send them to the headmaster. They started to make noises again...

One solution is to ask trainees to evaluate their lessons in two ways. Initially, at the start of the practice, trainees would be free to respond in their evaluation to the feeling of the moment. The next stage is to review with individual trainees any recurring areas that these open evaluations revealed, and build up from them a more structured evaluation sheet. This has the virtue that it recognizes that every classroom situation is different and every trainee has particular strengths and weaknesses—for example, one student was particularly concerned with his pupils' unwillingness to participate in oral lessons: 'They just won't say anything. They whisper. They aren't interested.' These comments can then form the basis of a more structured evaluation sheet for later use which focuses on this particular aspect: for example, asking the trainee to watch particularly whether any activities promoted oral interactions.

Trainees' perceptions of their own performance often differed markedly from those of the observer or supervisor, for example:

trainee: The lesson went OK. Students are more co-operative but raising hands are not heeded. I think they have reached their objectives.

supervisor: No plan and very chaotic approach to the materials. Has not reviewed the exercises. Extremely weak trainee—the lesson showed little understanding of the aim or language level of the class, questioning techniques or organization. Trainee's own English needs attention.

trainee: Students found lesson dull. The grammar bit was too simple for them. Difficult to maintain their attention. Students found passage on QEz not interesting.

supervisor: Lively and clear presentation. Children responded well to open and friendly manner. Lesson on s/v agreement was one X found difficult to make interesting—very much revision for the children so need to move quickly to production.

Some trainees seemed to feel that analysis of their own performance required a kind of self-denigration, for example:

I must follow my plan next time. I spent too much time on comparatives. There must not be any activity out of lesson plans. Must allocate time for every section skill so that the lesson will go as planned.

Some trainees, on the other hand, could find little to say about their own performance:

The lesson went well. Objectives achieved.

Feiman-Nemser and Buchmann (1987) similarly found that student teachers' ability to self-reflect remained at a fairly superficial level. Many trainees are so involved in the actual teaching process that they find it almost impossible to detach themselves from the crisis of the moment, and in many cases they lack the knowledge of teaching alternatives which might help them examine their practice. In addition, of course, young inexperienced trainees are often defensive and feel under threat from supervisors. It may be that in the early stages of learning to teach, trainees need to concentrate on acquiring a confident grasp of classroom routines and that critical analysis develops at a much later stage.