Peer Review

7 AMAZING Strategies to Make Writing Lesson Plans Easier - TeacherOfSci

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Reviewed:: Dec 16, 2019 by Teacher Education

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Ratings

Overall Rating:

Content Quality:

Effectiveness:

Ease of Use:

Overview:

In addition to a tutorial on how to write a lesson plan, this website provides information to help teachers with topics as Classroom Management, Technology in the Classroom & Learning Theories. Along with broad support in the form of Teacher News, Teacher Wellbeing and Money, Educational Product and Book Reviews, Free Teacher Resource Downloads.

Type of Material:

Resource

Recommended Uses:

Of course new teachers should find the 7 strategies for lesson planning to be helpful as they acquire this skill but new and seasoned teachers would find the other various support features to be helpful with many classroom issues, as well as guidance with stress, mental health, physical fitness faced issues by all teachers.

Technical Requirements:

No special technology requirements are needed to access this website.

Identify Major Learning Goals:

The author of the website is a high school science teacher, head of KS3 Science (year/grade 7-8), trainee teacher mentor and education blogger who understands teaching including "how much extra work is required and how mentally taxing" it is. With these wants to provide support for teachers everywhere.

For example he believes that how to create a lesson plan is "the question new teachers regularly struggle with!" and so provides 7 lesson planning strategies which "should make your planning much easier."

Target Student Population:

College Upper & Lower Division, Graduate School, Professional, teachers at all levels

Prerequisite Knowledge or Skills:

Teachers, trainers and those interested in teaching would need no special skills for using this site.

Content Quality

Rating:
Strengths:: The focus of this website is to support teachers and the author provides accepted models for each topic. For example, his learning theories section includes "explanations of the most important educational theories and new pedagogical theories with examples of how to use them." and include such theororists as Piaget, Vgotski, Bloom and Maslow, all presenting the common educationally significant concepts, models, and skills that everyone in teacher ed would study. The information provided is current with the most recent update to the site during September 2019.
Concerns:: The content of the website is of good quality. While simple, it is a good reminder for those already writing lesson plans and a great help to those learning to do so.

Potential Effectiveness as a Teaching Tool

Rating:

Strengths:

The goal of the website, as previously stated, is to support teachers so the learning objectives of the website are not clearly stated but inherent in the topics, materials & resources provided.

The teacher is the student in this case and after using the website they should be able to for example, explain a variety of learning theories, describe classroom management techniques, and create a successful lesson plan. They also would be able to list tips for staying healthy in a stressful career and find resources on current teaching practices.

Te learning materials at this site can be readily integrated into the curriculum and pedagogy for pre-teachers, in-service teachers, and teacher/training professionals and used in a variety of ways to achieve teaching and learning goals either by creating assignments using resources at the site or for professional development. For example, the "20 Huge Benefits of Using Technology in the Classroom", a 12 page, comprehensive list with explanations, would make an excellent presentation or topic for class discussion.

Concerns:

The website is an effective teaching tool.

Ease of Use for Both Students and Faculty

Rating:
Strengths:: The content is quite usable, but the ads can distract from the content.
Concerns:: Although tastefully done, the website is laden with ads including recommendations for books that have a cost and resources that would need to be purchased which can be distracting. To be fair, the author clearly states that he began his blog with income as his primary purpose before branching out into a website and other social media, and items with a cost are transparent. One of the main pages of the website asks the user to contact him if they are interested in sponsorship or partnerships of the site.

Other Issues and Comments:: Terms of Service & Privacy Policy is provided as well as contact information for the author, contact is encouraged. Cleaning up pop-ups would make the site more user friendly.
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