A Quality Lesson Plan

What makes a quality Art lesson plan?
In Emphasis Art chapter 3, there are 8 techniques the author suggests for teaching art, and when these are applied to a lesson plan, they can contribute to the quality of that lesson plan.
The techniques are:
Begin the lesson: get their attention
Keep the motivation brief
Get the design off to a good start
Teach nonverbally
Prevent bad starts
Nurture creativity and imagination
foster perseverance, stimulate extra effort
Clean up and evaluate
(Emphasis Art, pgs 30 - 33)
But most of these techniques are not in a lesson plan. Though they will help teach the students the desired goal, they don't have much to do with the actual paper lesson plan.
To create a quality lesson plan, it is probably best to start out with a template that will remind of what needs to be put into the lesson but still allows freedom to create a unique lesson.

Objectives:
Here site the tings you want the students to learn. "You must note that these objectives should not be activities that will be used in the lesson plan. Rather, they should be the learning outcomes of those activities." (Locke, p. 3)


Standards:
When creating an art lesson plan be sure that you are focusing on at least one of the state standards, put that here and explain how it is integrated into your lesson.

Vocabulary:
When integrating with other subjects (which is always a good idea) place words that correspond to the other subject as well as with your lesson here. Also put new words you are introducing to your students here.

Materials:
This is an important part of any lesson plan, Art or otherwise. Place everything needed to complete this lesson plan in this category.
This is essential for planning purposes, and also if another person wants to teach your lesson plan they will not have to guess what you used.

Anticipatory Set:
Something to lead into the main lesson, a small game or something like it that gets the children thinking about what they will be doing and how they will do it.

Pedagogy:
Here write down step by step instructions telling how to carry out the lesson plan. "These don't have to involve every little thing that the teacher will say and do, but they should list the relevant actions that the teacher needs in order to perform them." (Locke, p. 6)


Closure:
Bring your lesson to a close, either for the day or for the topic you studied that day.  


Assessment:
What you want to assess and how you will assess it.

"10. It's a really good idea for you to include a “Connections” section, which really shows how the lesson plan could be integrated with other subjects. An example of this would be to have students paint 2 oranges, then 3 more oranges below them, etc. so that they can learn how to integrate Art into the lesson plan." (Locke, p. 12)


Using each of these things in a lesson plan will help make it look good on paper, but only a great teacher can make it look good in practice.

Locke, Linda. "10 Steps to Developing a Quality Lesson Plan." Homeschooling Secrets. N.p., n.d. google. Web. 4 Apr. 2011. <http://www.learnatlast.com/10steps-to-developing-a-quality-lesson-plan.html>.

Shakespear, Maele. "Lesson Plan Template." Blackboard. N.p., n.d. Web. 4 Apr. 2011.

Wilson, Roylane. “Lesson Plan Template.” PEP 3500