Teaching Package

Paradigm for Lesson Planning
EN325 – Modern Grammar

There are many theories about what must be included in lesson plans and many suggested formats for each theory. This course (Modern Grammar) is not a class in lesson planning; thus, I will not dictate the theories and forms that are required for your lesson planning. Some of you will have learned appropriate forms in your other education classes, and you may adapt them to this class. This paradigm is intended for the use of all members of the course as a guide, but it should be especially useful to those of you who have not yet been taught theories and forms for lesson planning.

Your lessons in your teaching package should be developed according to the following:

1. You must have five fully-developed daily lesson plans in your package constituting approximately a week’s unit of study in one school discipline.
2. You must include grammatical study in each of these daily lesson plans constituting no more than 10 minutes of each class period.
3. The remainder of the lesson will be concentrated on the topic of the matrix discipline of the lesson. Other disciplines may be included as a part of your whole language approach to teaching.
4. Never teach Grammar without a context.  (This has come to be known as Glauner's first principle of grammar instruction.)
5. Avoid teaching grammar prescriptively except where students’ individual dialects differ from standard English in ways that have impact upon the lesson you are teaching. As much as possible, make the teaching of grammatical terms and concepts an integral part of everything else you are teaching.  Do not teach prescriptively in this set of lessons.

Your lesson plans might contain the following in somewhat this order:

1. Anticipatory set. This is a device that prepares the minds of the students for the lesson they are to learn during this class period. It should take no longer than three minutes.
2. Goals.  These encompass a global purpose for your lesson for the day.
3. Performance Objectives (required). These are specific objectives for your study that day. You should have at least one for each discipline you will be teaching in this class period including at least one for grammar and probably more than one for the matrix discipline. They should be written so as to prove that students have actually accomplished them (e.g., Students will demonstrate mastery of ________ by ____.)
4. Demonstration (required). In this segment, the teacher presents whatever the students need to know in order to become involved in the lesson.
5. Practice (required). Students will become involved with the activities of learning the lesson of the day.
6. Assessment (required). You will need some sort of assessment (individual and group) as the lesson continues and concludes to verify the extent to which your objectives/goals have been met.
7. Transition to the next lesson.

Remember that this is a paradigm, not a set of absolutes. Although you need to work within the spirit the above components, there are many ways of realizing them in the classroom without using the same terminology or order. Teachers must be constantly alert to the minute to minute needs of each student in the classroom. That means the lessons will not always follow exactly the pattern that you plan. That does not, however, mean that you should not plan.

A note on Benjamin Bloom’s Taxonomy.

1. Knowledge – Learning the concept or process.
2. Comprehension – Understanding the concept or process.
3. Application – Using the concept or process.
4. Analysis – Examining the parts of the concept or process.
5. Synthesis – Fitting the concept or process into a larger body of knowledge.
6. Evaluation – Judging the concept or process.

The six parts of the taxonomy are Blooms. The definitions are my synthesis.

In regard to a specific point of learning, the lower levels must be in place before higher levels may be approached effectively. Thus, if you are teaching in primary grades, you should concentrate first upon the lower levels (knowledge, comprehension, application) before moving to the higher levels. A young child’s untutored evaluation, for instance, will probably be either "cool" or "this sucks." A more scholarly evaluation follows learning in the lower levels.

That does not mean that first graders do not or should not analyze, synthesize, or evaluate. Such processes are applied from birth on as new topics for learning are broached. You should be helping them to gain mastery of them. What you must recognize in your teaching is that an important way for students to learn to involve higher levels of learning about a concept or process is to master the previous level. Your lesson plans should reflect your understanding of the above.

Note on Howard Gardner's "Theory of Multiple Intelligences."

Gardner has helped us to make a giant leap in our approaches to teaching and learning by recognizing that what we have traditionally thought of as intelligence is narrow and limiting.  He encourages us to recognize seven styles of learning . 

1.  Linguistic
2.  Logical-Mathematical
3.  Spatial
4.  Musical
5.  Bodily-Kinesthetic
6.  Interpersonal
7.  Intrapersonal

Three important implications emerge.

First, we need to be able to learn through all of these styles.  Thus, as teachers, we must help our students to improve upon their skills at learning in all  styles, even the ones that particular students don't  incline toward naturally. 

Second, we must allow students to self-actualize in the learning styles that come naturally to them.  Thus, as teachers, we must learn how to permit various learning styles to be employed, and we must find means of assessing the results.

Third, as useful as Gardner's analysis is, it is a woefully inadequate tool for examining the complex processes of learning.  Following it religiously can be as harmful as ignoring it completely.

Think about this in your lesson planning.