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Planning sits at the heart of every teacher’s daily practice. Effective teaching relies on structured thinking across three levels: long-term, medium-term and short-term. Each type of planning supports different aspects of learning, helping to ensure lessons are purposeful, well-sequenced and tailored to pupil needs.

Long-Term Planning: Mapping the Curriculum

Long-term planning outlines the core skills and knowledge pupils need to succeed in a subject. These plans often cover the whole school year or even an entire Key Stage. They focus on the sequence of learning and ensure coverage of the full curriculum. Good long-term planning keeps teaching aligned with national curriculum objectives and supports a clear learning journey.

Medium-Term Planning: Connecting Curriculum to the Classroom

Medium-term planning takes the long-term goals and breaks them into smaller units or modules. These plans focus on specific objectives, expected outcomes and key knowledge to be taught over a half-term or term. Medium-term planning helps ensure continuity across lessons, while allowing for flexibility based on pupil progress and emerging needs.

Short-Term Planning: Structuring Lessons Effectively

Short-term planning is where the detail of teaching lives. Lesson planning involves organising learning activities, identifying assessment points, listing required resources, and thinking about how support staff will be used. Teachers also plan for the introduction of key vocabulary and how to differentiate lessons for diverse learners.

Effective lesson planning takes into account what pupils already know, including any misconceptions, and what knowledge they will need to access new content. As pupils vary widely in ability, background and prior experience, teachers must plan to meet individual needs and remove potential barriers to learning.

Key Elements of a Strong Lesson Plan

Lesson plan templates may differ between schools, but the fundamentals of good planning are consistent. A strong lesson starts by identifying what knowledge and understanding pupils are expected to develop. This might include disciplinary and substantive knowledge or procedural and conceptual knowledge. What matters most is clarity.

It is not enough to plan interesting activities. Each activity must be connected to clear learning objectives. Teachers should always ask: what should pupils know, understand and be able to do by the end of the lesson? Without this clarity, it becomes difficult to judge whether progress has been made.

Turning Knowledge Into Action

It is important to distinguish between what pupils know and understand, and what they can demonstrate or apply. Teachers must think carefully about how learning will be shown in practice. This allows for meaningful assessment and helps ensure that teaching is having the intended impact.

Lesson objectives must lead to observable outcomes that can be used to evaluate pupil progress. When we understand what success looks like, we can plan more effectively for how to get there.

Choosing Effective Teaching Strategies

Once the desired knowledge and skills have been identified, the next step is to plan how best to teach them. Experienced teachers often draw on a wide range of strategies informed by subject expertise and classroom experience. Early career teachers may rely more on advice from colleagues, professional development or instinct as they find their style.

A useful guide for planning high-quality lessons is Rosenshine’s Principles of Instruction, which outlines ten research-informed strategies for effective teaching. These include techniques such as modelling, scaffolding and checking for understanding. While these principles offer helpful reminders, it is the teacher’s responsibility to apply them thoughtfully and purposefully in their own subject context.

Planning remains one of the most important and complex parts of teaching. It requires careful thought about pupils, content, sequencing and outcomes. At its best, planning connects long-term goals with daily classroom decisions and helps every pupil make progress.

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Reference
Rosenshine, B. (2012). Principles of Instruction: Research-based strategies that all teachers should know. American Educator, 36(1), 12.

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