Teach English in Huangshan Zhen - Linyi Shi

When it comes to teaching, there is a variety of skills every teacher must know in order to educate their students successfully. These skills take time and effort for a teacher to successfully master. Some of these skills include Classroom Management, Cultural sensitivity, and the ability to teach both large and small groups. All these skills are relevant, and important to the classroom. But in my opinion, the most important skill for any teacher to learn is Lesson planning, because a lesson plan is a step-by-step guide that provides a structure for the learning lesson. One reason a lesson plan is important in a classroom, is that it helps a teacher by reminding the teacher of the aims and objectives of the lesson in an organized way. A lesson plan should inform what the subject of the lesson is, what the students should understand regarding the lesson, and what information the students should take away from the lesson by the end of class. This is crucial to the success of the lesson. If a teacher was to teach without a lesson plan, these objectives could become lost. Which would lead to an ineffective lesson. A second reason lesson planning is important is that a lesson plan helps keep a lesson on time, and on topic. A well written lesson plan provides a teacher with a specific amount of time to spend on each section of a lesson and will provide approved topics to focus on during class. This is necessary for a successful lesson because it is often easy to lose track of time and go off topic in a group of students. For example, one student might mention the movie they saw on the weekend, resulting in a class discussion about the movie. If a teacher does not have a lesson plan with approved topics and a set time frame, the class could easily spend minutes off topic, resulting in minutes of lost learning time. With a well-structured lesson plan, the teacher can be sure to keep the class to a tight schedule, thus keeping distractions to a minimum. Another reason a well written lesson plan is important is that allows a teacher to plan out specific activities for the students. Creating a lesson plan allows a teacher to prepare several different ways of explaining the material (real-life examples, analogies, visuals, etc.) to catch the attention of more students, and appeal to different learning styles. Planning the activity ahead of time allows the teacher to take into account different questions and needs the students might have during the lesson, allowing the teacher to come up with solutions ahead of time. This planning ahead of time will result in the activity going more smoothly, increasing class productivity. Lastly, lesson planning is important because it results in a teacher being more confident in the classroom. Having a well written lesson plan can make a teacher feel more prepared in the classroom. This will result in a teacher entering the classroom and conducting the lesson with confidence. Confidence is a key skill for all teachers, because student observe their teacher’s level of confidence, and use that observation to dictate their level of involvement in class. This is because students tend to look at their teacher’s behavior as an example for how the class should act. If a teacher were to conduct a lesson without following a proper lesson plan, the students might pick up on their teachers lack of readiness and lack of confidence. If this were to happen the students might hesitate to use English in the classroom. How can they be confident in learning English, when their instructor is not confident teaching English? With a proper lesson plan, a teacher will be able to conduct a lesson with confidence, thus setting the bar for the level of confidence and involvement for the students. This, and all of these reasons, are why lesson planning is important for any teacher.