As I began to think about the first part of this question I ask myself, would I take a trip without making a plan? Would I hope I could find a hotel when and where I would need it along the way? Would I wait until a few days before leaving to purchase a plane ticket for this trip? Would I pack my bags the day of my trip? Would I leave all of these important decisions to hope and fate? My response: of course not. Teaching in the classroom is no different. I cannot wake up every day and say, “Hey! What do I feel like teaching today?” I have to have a master plan. In order to see the “big” plan and know where I am going, I have to plan each lesson day-by-day in order to accomplish all of the goals and objectives I have set for my students to meet.
Making an annual plan is a necessity and has many benefits; yet, there are also some disadvantages of an annual plan as well. One major advantage of an annual plan is that it steers teachers in the right direction. There are many goals and objectives which teachers must teach their students. A teacher can look at an annual plan and say, “Okay I have 180 days to fit in all of these goals and objectives and this is how I am going to do it.” The annual plan helps teachers see the big picture (giving them directions) so they can break up this big picture into much smaller pictures and plan monthly lessons, weekly lessons and daily lessons. When you take a trip you first decide where you want to go, what you want to see, what types of things you want to do, and how long your trip will be. Creating an annual plan is no different than going on a trip. Teachers must decide where they want to take their students (goals and objectives), how they would like to go about helping them reach these goals, what types of activities they will perform and how many days it will take to teach a certain lesson.
Another advantage of an annual plan is that it helps teachers avoid panic. Again, teachers do not wake up every day and say, “Hey! What would l like to teach today?” Instead teachers must have a plan so that they do not find themselves sitting in the classroom before their students oblivious to what they want to teach. When teachers know what they will be teaching they can appear confident in themselves and their abilities. This avoids panic for themselves and for their students. If a student feels that a teacher is unsure of herself or her skills, this can cause the children to feel scared or unsure of themselves as well.
As with most things in life, there are disadvantages. One major disadvantage of an annual plan is time. Planning an annual plan is very time consuming. It requires lots of hours to “map out” a plan for the entire school year. Another disadvantage of an annual plan is that it can be overwhelming for first year teachers. First year teachers have so many things to learn such as what to teach, how to teach the content, how to control the behavior in the classroom, how to write lesson plans, etc. Although I feel that an annual plan will benefit the first year teacher, taking on such a challenging task can be overwhelming. Another disadvantage of an annual plan is that your co-workers might not support you in this endeavor. This may mean a teacher will have to design the annual plan on his/her own. Again, this can be time consuming. If supported by co-workers designing an annual plan can be much less stress and time consuming.
I have always wanted to go to Australia. I want to see the kangaroos, the beaches, the scenery, and experience the culture. One day I decide to plan my trip. I call my travel agent. I decide I want to stay for two weeks. I want to go the first month of August and I want to stay in Sydney. I give my travel agent all of the details and she plans my trip. Before finalizing my trip the agent asks for my credit card number to book my hotel. At this point I realize I don’t have the resources (ie. Money). After spending endless time, effort and energy I realize that I cannot afford the trip I have just spent the day planning. My whole day I realize has been wasted. This analogy can be applied to planning an annual lesson plan. When planning an annual lesson, no matter how great the lessons are you have planned or how many great ideas you have, if you do not have the proper resources the lesson cannot be implemented and you have just spent many hours planning something that is unattainable. To avoid this situation, it is important to look at the resources you will need for implementing your annual plan and making sure you have all these resources. When planning my trip to Australia I thought my “resources” were a very small part of the planning. Once I realized I didn’t have the money, my entire day was wasted on planning a trip that wasn’t feasible for me to take. For a teacher, it is important to look at your resources before designing an annual plan to know what you have to work with and design your “trip” around your resources.
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Great analogies in your response and very applicable. This statement stood out to me; "If a student feels that a teacher is unsure of herself or her skills, this can cause the children to feel scared or unsure of themselves as well.". This was my dilemma as a first year (second, third) teacher...I was the one who had an issue with SS and it came across that way to my students so they began to dislike it as well. We live and learn and hopefully those students won't be scarred for life ;)
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