Lesson Plans and the Teacher Candidate:
Is the Internet Helping or Hindering?

Barba Aldis Patton
University of Houston-Victoria

     Teacher candidates are expected to become proficient in many areas during their academic stint. One of those areas is the preparation of lesson plans. Lesson plans are a vital part of the preparation of each and every lesson. The planning and implementation of the lesson plan maybe considered a necessary evil however; it does provide the classroom teacher with a plan to make available opportunities for the students to master the curriculum. It is also a form of documentation for accountability.
     This study came to be as a professor/researcher became beware of two distinguishing aspects which were occurring repeatedly in the classrooms with teacher candidates 1) many lesson plan assignments were citing internet sources and 2) quality of the submitted lesson plans was decreasing. The purpose of the study was to gain data to provide teacher candidates knowledge which would enable them to prepare quality lesson plans. Hopefully, the improved lesson planning will lead to higher test scores for EC-4 students who will be in these teacher candidates’ classroom in the near future.
     Three hundred math lessons were evaluated. The lesson plans were part of a requirement in a math and science methodology class for EC-4 teacher candidates. The teacher candidates were given 1) guidelines as to the expected components of each lesson, 2) suggestions of possible sources of ideas i.e. professional journals, and 3) sample lesson plans. Taylor’s (2000) and Frieberg’s (2002) research found that extensive planning is essential for meaningful lessons to be taught in the classroom. “Experts spend more time in front-end-analysis or planning and trying to understand the domain than novices, while novices immediately begin to consider in detail numerous design strategies”(Perez, Johnson, Emery, 1995). This supports the need for teacher candidates to master the art of preparing quality lesson plans.
     Research question for the study was: Do the lessons reflect a) introduction, b) objectives (measurable), c) list of materials or supplies needed, d) input of information or procedure, e) assessment of lesson, and f) timeframe?
     In the pre-internet era, it was a given that almost any printed material that a teacher or teacher candidate selected as an aid or source in the preparation of a lesson would have been reviewed (either blind or peer) prior to being printed. However today, anyone can put almost anything on internet. Therefore lesson plans are not exception.
     The teacher candidates need to be able to create and implement quality lessons to be prepared for the classroom. In this study a quality lesson plan contains:
(See Figure 1)
     When an internet search for lesson plans was conducted, there were a little over 11 million hits which makes it an impossible to review each. From an internet user’s-experience, the researcher believed that many of the sites would be duplicates if the search was actually possible. With that assumption, the researcher estimates that if each sites had multi-listing there were still most likely over a one hundred thousand individual hits. This estimate would most likely be error on the low end as one hundred thousand would be less than 1% of the original 11 million hits on the original search.
     Math lesson plans from 200 of these online sites were downloaded and analyzed only to find that about 1 in 10 or 10% were quality lessons. The sites selected to download were randomly selected from the ‘search’. Most of the sites had multi lesson plans covering an array of areas, i.e. science, reading, social studies, math, etc.; however, only one EC-4 math lesson plan was evaluated from each site. Unofficially, other subject lesson plans were also perused and basically the same results were true.
     After an extensive search of lesson plans offered online, it became apparent that (1) learning objectives were either a) not included or b) were very vague and 2) there were almost no lesson plans which had an assessment which meet the desired level of quality. While many sites claimed to have lesson plans in reality they were an outline or thought for an entire unit or theme. Assessments on the various lesson plans were non-existent or were in a very weak form for documentation. These findings created concern as to exactly how will these teacher candidates will precede when it is time to put a mark on a parent report card or progress report.
     Next the study focused on the 300 math lesson plans submitted in an EC-4 math and science methodology class by teacher candidates. First, the submitted lessons were grouped into two groups, one which citied internet source and the other which did not use an internet source. Approximately three fourths of the submitted lesson plans had an internet citing. Eighty percent (180 out of 225) of the lesson plans which had an internet citing were deemed as poor quality. A lesson plan which scored 75% or less was considered poor quality. Using a researcher designed rubric each of the lessons was examined with respect to the introduction, objective, input or procedure and assessment. Cabe’s (1996) and Moxley (2007) work provided insight on the lesson components when the rubric was being developed.
(See Figure 2)
     A simple percentage was the statistic utilized as few teacher candidates had any statistical background. This simple method was selected as it would be more informative for the teacher candidates. The teacher candidates were undergraduates who were enrolled in one of the last classes in their program prior to student teaching. Some of the findings of the analysis of the internet citied lesson plans were:
(See Table 1)
     The sixty subjects who submitted the lesson plans were 98% female between the ages of 22 and 55. The subjects attended a traditional face to face class during a long-term semester.
 There were about 25% (75) of the lessons which did not cite an internet source. Of this group approximately 60% (45) were deemed as good to excellent quality. Even though 60% is a lower than desired rate of quality, it is considerably higher than the other group. The 40% (30) of the lessons which were not high quality creates a concern that some of these used internet sources but did not cite the source.
    When the teacher candidates were interviewed as a group, they stated that they really felt that if it were on the internet that it was good and quality. Most of the teacher candidates even said that they did not really even do a quality type test as they just assumed that it was quality since it was found on internet
    As the result of the investigation, the researcher believes that everyone who is in a classroom should be aware that the lesson plans found on the internet may be of quality but that they should be examined carefully before implementing into the curriculum. Planning a unit of instruction can be an overwhelming task. Make life a little easier on yourself by writing quality lesson plans which will keep you -- and your unit -- organized. (Gallagher 2001)

References
Cabe, P. A. (1996). ATOMIC: a course and lesson planning mnemonic’. College Teaching 44, 149-52.
Freiberg, H. J. (2002) Essential skills for new teachers. Educational Leadership. 59(6) 56-60.
Gallagher, J. (2001) “Planning a unit of instruction’ Teaching PreK-8. 32, 88-9.
Ohanian, S. (1985). ‘On stir and serve recipes for teaching.’Phi Delta Kappan.696-701.
Moxley, R. A. (2007). Graphing in the classroom for improving instruction: from lesson plans to research.
     Education and Treatment of Children. 30 (2) 111-26.
Perez, R. S., Johnson, J. F., Emery, C.D. (1995). Instructional design expertise: a cognitive model of design. Instructional
      Science. 23. 321-49.
Taylor, P. M., (2000) ‘When are we ever going to use this? Lessons from a mathematics methods course’.
     School Science and Mathematics, 100(5) 252-5.

Figure 1

Figure 2

** To determine the percentage, multiply the sum received on the categories by 4.
            
Table 1