The Student Lesson Plan: A New Approach
According to (Davies, 1999, as cited in Biesta, 2007), “The idea that education
should be or become an evidence-based practice and that teaching should be or
become an evidence-based profession has recently come to prominence in
several countries around the world.” Over the past several decades in the United States, instructors at all levels are being encouraged to embrace and implement more philosophies and techniques that promote student-centered instructional strategies that focus on performance-based results instead of consistently relying on teacher-centered methodologies as the standard practice for preparing learners for the 21st century world. For the most part, educators, who have been teaching for a substantial amount of time, recognize that gone are the days of teaching the “way we were taught” with no teacher accountability, standardization and/or dissection of outcomes. As professional educators and scholars, we must understand the importance of educational philosophers such as, Dewey, Tyler, as well as other theorists and philosophers that have helped us arrive at this current mindset in regards to the definitions, expectations and the assessments that identify and delineate effective versus ineffective instruction. As the push for student-centered instruction continues, I have come to grasp that the standard approach that we currently use for planning instruction for meeting the standards and goals is in direct contrast with the student-centered philosophy. Although the verbiage of the terms of “objectives, standards, and the results of standardized test scores” have been around for decades, the pressure to succeed as been “stepped up” since the implementation of NCLB. As early as 1949, Tyler purposes the following questions on the first page of his text, Basic Principles of Curriculum and Instruction: “But how are objectives obtained? Is there any place for a systematic attack upon the problem of what objectives to seek?” (p.3).
The early theorists have laid the foundation for our current mindset of student-centerrning. Are you familiar with the definitions and principles of constructivism? Constructivism‘s ideology has developed over the years due to works by such theorists as Piaget, Bruner, Vygotsky, and Dewey, and in a constructivist classroom, students participate actively in their own learning, which involves problem solving strategies and critical thinking skills (Carol, 2001). I am a true constructivist by heart, and I cannot believe that it has taken me so long to become aware of the current paradox in regards to the standard approach that we as professional educators use for planning and implementing instruction. It is now time for us to bridge the two concepts together. As stated almost a decade ago by (Applefied, Huber, and Moallem, 2000) who documented “Although constructivism is a theory about learning rather than a description of teaching, some important strides toward defining the relationship between theory and practice have been made.” We must now continue these strides ten years later. Therefore, I make the following proposal: the student lesson plan. The basic premise or design of this technique is simplistic in style and format for the purposes of establishing a “blueprint” or universal approach that can be applied to any level or course. The student lesson plan allows for student ownership and for students to construct their own meaning based on their own intellectual strengths and talents within the confines of the course objectives, standards, and/or competencies. To demonstrate how this process could be implemented at the various levels of education, I have included 2 examples (Appendix A represents an accelerated college course, and Appendix B represents a high school course). Also, I have designed the two appendices to represent how a gradual shift can be made from the teacher-designed lesson plan to the student-centered lesson plan. Appendix C has been included as a “guiding tool” for instructors and students to help in the initial brainstorming and dialoguing of the process.
Step 1: At the beginning of every course, the Instructor distributes to the students the course’s content/syllabus/curriculum of any given course in a simplistic broad spectrum.
Step 2: The student designs their own lesson plan(s) on what information/skills/talents that they hope to obtain from the course’s content, how they will demonstrate mastery, and how they plan to use the newly acquired information in the future.
Step 3: The instructor works with the student to provide feedback, and approves ideas, submitted by the student.
Step 4: The student and instructor work together (based on the timelines of the course) to monitor progress and to make any adjustments that are necessary.
Step 5: At the end
