Let us consider the quality of our lessons. To keep it simple, we will consider lessons as being either (a) good (b) bad or (c) standard. It is safe to say that the overwhelming majority of planning advice is focused on the first of these: how to plan good (or even 'outstanding') lessons. This, when you think about it, seems odd. The majority of lessons are likely to fall into the 'standard' category (that's what standard means) - shouldn't we, then, focus on planning these well? And what about the 'bad' lessons? Surely it would be more valuable to improve these, than to focus only on the best?
Our lesson planning method will therefore concentrate not on planning outstanding lessons (though obviously we encourage you to do so) - we will be focusing on two specific goals: to ensure that the vast majority of your lessons are planned, and in particular that your worst lessons are planned.
We are talking here about really bad lessons. Not just lessons which don't turn out too well, or lessons in which something bad happens. We are talking about lessons in which virtually no learning takes place, where the students are left to their own devices, and where the teacher might as well not be present at all. Of course, nobody sets out to deliver lessons like these. They just happen. Perhaps the teacher is unwell, or under the weather (this is often a euphemism for 'hangover'). Perhaps other priorities (marking? OFSTED preparation?) demand that the teacher is mentally absent, or perhaps the teacher really is absent, and last minute cover has been organised.
These are lessons where videos are shown (sometimes videos the class have seen before), where students do 'self study' or 'independent learning', or catch up on homework, or just read, or, well, just try not to make too much noise or else.
We really need a system of planning and an approach to quality which deals with these. We'll let OFSTED deal with the outstanding lessons. Most students report, of course, that on the day before an OFSTED inspection, the quality of teaching, and the quality of lessons, is apalling. The teachers are much too busy preparing to deliver outstanding lessons tomorrow...