Lesson Planning

There are many different ways to format lesson plans. Some links to sample lesson plans and lesson plan formats are provided below. Most problems in the classroom are the result of poor planning. If you don't know what you expect the students to learn on a particular day, they will find something else to fill up the time - and it is usually not educationally productive.

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* Links to offsite resources

The Educator's Reference Desk Here are a variety of mainly general music lesson plans for all grades. Teacher.Net Lesson Bank Some of the lessons here are the same as the previous two, but the list is more extensive. Lesson Plans 4 Teachers This is a list of the top rated music lesson plan sites according to this site. There are links to 15 great resources.

teAchnology Lesson Plans Another set of mainly general music lesson plans from an online resource. New Hampshire Public Television Knowledge Network This is a great site that links to several other lesson plan websites. It also includes Webquests - a way to integrate technology into your music classroom. Lakeshore Concert Band - Educational Resources There are some links on this site that lead to lesson planning for the concert band. There are some other great resources on this page as well.

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If you have not downloaded the Kansas Music Standards, do it now.

There are many sample lesson plans included as well as several assessment tools for evaluating those lessons.

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As always, check with your school district first to see what your principal or supervising teacher expects to be included in your lesson plans. Generally, your lesson plan should include the following:

• Goals: What do you expect your students to be able to do by the end of the lesson, unit, or day? How does it fit your overall curriculum?
• Objectives: What do you want the students to know/be able to do by the end of the lesson?
• Materials Needed: What materials will you need to be sure this lesson is successful? This helps you make sure things are prepared ahead of time.
• Lesson Description: This is a step-by-step description of what and how you are planning to teach the lesson.
• Closure: What activity or activities will help reinforce the learning that took place during the lesson?
• Assessment: How do you plan to assess the skills that the students were to learn during the lesson? It can be as simple as a personal observation to as complex as rubrics for each student.

Here is a basic lesson plan format.
(MS Excel format)