Customizing Your Lesson Plan
Although instructors have great training resources at their disposal, they still need to prepare for teaching by customizing their lesson plans. When you mark up the instructor guide with good questions or ideas for alternative activities or insert copies of job aids or handouts you have created, you are, in a sense, making the course your own. You can refer to: Tool and Techniques for information on a wide range of instructional techniques and strategies, practice activities, assessment methods and tools, and ideas you can use to customize the lesson plan. You can also add content with references to local conditions or issues to increase the relevance of the course.
While instructors need to cover all the technical content in a course and use the provided instructor guide and visuals, you can adapt the instructional strategies to meet the needs of the participants. For instance, if a specific group of participants is hesitant to join in the class discussions, you can switch to small group activities to encourage their participation. Or, if you are pressed for time and you know that the participants already have strong backgrounds in content in one unit, you can find a different way to present what is review material without as much time on each of the slides in the unit.
The benefits to customizing the lesson plan include:
- Ownership of the material: If you have taken the time to customize your lesson plan, you will have a better sense of ownership of the material. Based on the instructional experience and your individual teaching style, you are free to choose the specific teaching methods, illustrative examples, or practice activities that meet the participants’ learning needs.
- Grasp of the delivery: As you review and make notes in the instructor guide, you will become more familiar with the material and the options for delivery. The process helps to create a more intimate relationship with the content. The experience will help you project more confidence and personal experience when you teach.
- Self-Awareness: When you customize the course lesson plan, consider how you will deliver the content. It is important to recognize that the slides are not your script and that they are just visual aids to help reinforce your training delivery. It will help you think ahead regarding what you are going to say, do, and ask participants. Thinking about this in advance will help you become more self-aware as an instructor. It will also push you to assess what your strengths are as an instructor.
- Are you effective at asking thought-provoking questions? Then brainstorm interesting questions in advance to help learners think through problems together with you.
- Do you have great examples to enhance the content? Use them.
- Can you think of an interesting scenario to role-play? Plan it out in advance.
The lesson plan customization process forces you to think about the flow of the training session. It also gives you a chance to consider if there are other ways for you to explain and sequence the content. You might choose to follow the sequence of slides, but if a different sequence makes more sense for your approach to the content, you are free to change the order of the slides. If you change the slide order, remember to let participants know so they can follow along in their workbooks.
It is important to remember that a lesson plan is a living document. Not every activity or technique works the same with every audience. But keep experimenting with your delivery. Make a note when things go well, as well as ideas for improvement when things don’t go as planned. If you review and update the lesson plan regularly, you will eventually figure out a range of effective teaching approaches.
The following sections in this chapter will lead you through the 7-step process that experienced instructors use to plan an excellent training session (figure 15). If you are an inexperienced instructor or new to lesson planning, you can start small and customize one unit at a time. If you are more familiar with the process, you can take a hard look at your delivery and the content of an entire you. You can use the Action Plan at the bottom of this page to help you customize a lesson.
The first step is to think about the course from the participants’ viewpoint. Ask yourself:
- What job(s) do they want or need to get done?
- What do they need to do differently?
- What are they going to learn from this training?
- What decision(s) do they need to make?
- How will you know they are successful?
It is crucial for you to review the learning outcomes before you customize the lesson plan. The learning outcomes can give you a good sense of the scope of the lesson. They will help you prioritize the “need to know” content rather than focusing on the “nice to know” content. Look at the action verb that starts each learning outcome. It will explain what participants are expected to do when they are competent at the task, skill, or behavior. The verb can also be a clue to which instructional strategy or strategies you should use to help participants demonstrate mastery.
For more information on lesson planning using learning outcomes, go to Identifying Learning Outcomes and the Using Outcome Verb to Make Instructional Decisions.
A great lesson always has a solid opening. The opening is often what determines whether the instructor will be successful in a course or lesson. But openings are often rushed or overlooked. It is essential to plan and practice an effective opening to open a course and start each unit or lesson. Openings are very versatile. You can use an opening to:
- Gain a better understanding of the participants
- Trigger interest in the topic
- Preview new material
- Highlight key points
If you use the few minutes of the lesson strategically, you can create a sense of excitement and desire to learn in the participants. At the same time, you can gather key details about them that will help you tailor the course to their specific needs.
For example, if you choose to introduce a topic with a hypothetical scenario, you will immediately engage participants in the content by getting them to consider possible outcomes. Their responses will provide you with information about their background knowledge and experience so you can better meet participants’ needs.
To start his NHI “Instructor Development Course” training presentation, the “Project Development Process,” Ed Woolford led with a question, “How many of you have had project delays caused by late utility discoveries?” The question served two purposes: it immediately gave participants a reason to pay attention and gave Ed an idea of how many participants in his group had project development experience.
For more information on options for creating a strong opening, go to Setting the Hook
The instructor’s goal is to create an active learning environment for the participants so they will be able to master the learning outcomes. Active learning strategies produce knowledge that lasts beyond the classroom. They also encourage critical thinking, creativity, and collaboration that are highly valued in the workplace.
The instructor guide may feature a lecture script, but you can take that as just a suggestion. You are expected to incorporate different instructional and practice strategies that will better align with the learning outcomes. Use the action verb in each learning outcome as a guide to select an appropriate learning strategy.
Note: If something works, don’t break it. But, if your experience shows the as-written material does not fully meet the needs of participants, you should consider what strategy might support learners better. This may be the case when you often have a large population of non-target audience members in your class.
The 10 most common learning strategies used in NHI courses are:
- Lectures, see Lectures and Interactive Lectures
- Interactive Lectures, see Lectures and Interactive Lectures
- Large-group Discussions, see Group Discussions
- Small-group Discussions, see Group Discussions
- Case Studies
- Quick Writes/Entrance Tickets
- Demonstrations
- Role Playing
- Hands-on Practice Activities
- Games
For more information on selecting an appropriate instructional strategy go to Using the Outcome Verb to Make Instructional Decisions.
It is important to note that you are not restricted to the frequently used strategies listed above. You can explore the wide range of instructional techniques and strategies, practice activities, assessment methods and tools, and ideas for course materials in Tools and Techniques.
As you look across the classroom, how can you tell which participants are keeping up with the content and which ones need clarification or extra support? Tests and quizzes are just one way for you to take measure of learner comprehension. But it is best not to wait until the end of a lesson to determine that some participants have knowledge gaps or came away with misconceptions.
One simple, but effective way for you and the participants to monitor their learning is to ask thoughtful knowledge check questions at strategic points during a lesson. When customizing your lesson plan, review the learning outcomes and ask yourself: “What are the most important and difficult concepts in this lesson?” Then, write questions to address those difficult concepts. It is a good rule of thumb to insert a meaningful question every 3–5 minutes during an interactive lecture.
When writing questions, it is important to remember that there are two types of questions: application and recall. Use recall questions when you want participants to produce facts or other details from the course. For example, “What are the characteristics of a Thru-Turn intersection?” Application questions require higher level thinking because participants need to apply their knowledge in a unique way. They are often open-ended and do not have a single, correct answer. An example of an application question is, “How would you sell the concept of a Thru-Turn intersection to your local planning committee?”
Another way to check on participants’ understanding is to insert short quiz questions at key points in your training presentation. You can ask participants to respond through a show of hands or, if you have the technology, use electronic “clickers.” For more information on incorporating quiz questions into the lesson, go to Surveys/Interactive Polls.
Example
In his NHI “Instructor Development Course” training presentation, “Sidewalk Collapse US 1 over Earman River,” Richard Kerr inserted an animated slide with a multiple-choice question to help monitor his participants’ understanding (figure 16). He presented the answer after participants responded.
Another often overlooked component of a successful training session is the conclusion to the lesson. A well-written conclusion can:
- Reinforce learning
- Reiterate key points
- Connect new learning to previously covered topics
- Present a call to action
- Preview future lessons
Some phrases you can use to begin your conclusion include:
- “What is something you learned today that you will apply right away when you get back to your job?”
- “What are your big takeaways from this lesson?
- “In our next lesson, we are going to expand on _____.”
- “Building on what we learned in the previous lesson, ...”
- “How do you plan to use this information during your next ___?”
One of the greatest challenges for instructors is to deliver the “need to know” content and complete all the planned activities in the given period. Often, instructors find that they take too long in some sections and feel they need to rush through content or skip activities in later sections.
Getting a handle on the pacing of your instruction can take time and practice. But customizing your lesson plan gives you an opportunity to explore and preview the timeline for your training session.
When planning your timeline for instruction:
- Decide how much time each activity will take and write it into your plan.
- Identify what material must be covered fully and what items can be skipped if you are short on time.
- Try not to spend more than 20 minutes on one single activity (unless it is individual work/writing/calculations). An average person has an attention span of 20 minutes or less, so your instruction will suffer if you don’t introduce a dynamic change at that point.
- Make sure that you are prepared, and have all activities in writing, even if you explain them verbally. A lot of useful instructional time can get lost on awkward explanations and clunky transitions.
Use the action plan in table 4 to guide your decisions when planning a lesson.
Step | Considerations |
---|---|
Step 1: Participants’ Needs |
The first step is to think about the course from the participants’ viewpoint. Ask yourself:
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Use this space to record your thoughts about participants’ learning needs. |
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Step 2: Outcomes |
Learning outcomes help you focus on the critical content and control what is taught. Critical information and skills are the “need to know” elements of the training and should be reflected in the learning outcomes; anything else is “nice to know” information that participants shouldn’t be held accountable for learning. You need to communicate the learning outcomes in a way that links them to participants’ professional development needs. They need to know what they are going to learn and why the learning is important. Ask yourself:
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Use this space to record your thoughts about participants’ learning needs. |
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Step 3: Opening |
A great lesson will always have a solid opening. Openings are very versatile. They can be used to gain a better understanding of your participants and trigger interest in the topic. How much do they know? How can I modify this presentation to fit this specific group of participants? These questions can be answered if you use your first minutes of your lesson strategically. |
Use this space to record your thoughts about participants’ learning needs. |
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Step 4: Learning Strategies |
Every instructional strategy has advantages and challenges. NHI will provide recommended strategies for you. As an instructor, you know what your participants need, what they already know about the content, how they might use it, and what they want to get out of the training course. What mechanisms might help these participants best interact with the content? |
Use this space to record your thoughts about participants’ learning needs. |
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Step 5: Check for Understanding |
The instructor must plan to check for understanding during each segment of training. Thoughtful and timely questions are the best way to measure participants’ progress and comprehension ahead of formal assessments. |
Use this space to record your thoughts about participants’ learning needs. |
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Step 6: Conclusion |
A great lesson plan would use a conclusion strategically, to reinforce learning and retention and to build logical bridges between new and old content. |
Use this space to record your thoughts about participants’ learning needs. |
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Step 7: Timing |
The timeline of instruction—or “pace”—is central to the efficiency of the training. Decide how much time each activity will take, and write it into your plan. Decide what material must be covered fully, and what items can be dropped if you are short on time. |
Use this space to record your thoughts about participants’ learning needs. |