Lesson Plan Essentials Utilizing Gagne’s Nine Events of Instruction To Build Effective Lessons By Sharon Mahabir

Discuss With your table: What makes a lesson effective? What do you feel is the most important part of the lesson plan cycle? Teachers should discuss their experiences with lessons. Encourage discussion on what types of things should be included in every lesson. Tables will share orally their thoughts. Record ideas on chart paper.

Born in Maine in 1916; died in 2002 About Robert Gagné Born in Maine in 1916; died in 2002 Began developing his learning theory while serving as Director of the U.S. Air Force Perceptual and Motor Skill Laboratory Believed that the traditional methods of learning did not aid in improving training results Taught as a professor at Connecticut College for Women and Penn State University. Developed 3 key principles that he believed made for more effective instruction: providing instruction on smaller tasks that lead to a final task Working to see that each smaller task is mastered Creating a logical sequence to the smaller tasks to ensure that mastery occurred

Robert Gagne’s Theory Five Types of Learning Verbal Information Intellectual Skills Cognitive Strategies Verbal Information—Ability to retrieve stored information Intellectual Skills--The ability to “distinguish, combine, tabulate, classify, analyze and quantify objects, events, and symbols” (Gredler, 2009) This is where the majority of learning occurs in schools. Cognitive Strategies—The ability to develop strategies to aid in one’s learning Metacognition—thinking about one’s thinking

Robert Gagne’s Theory Five Types of Learning Motor Skills Attitude Think-Pair-Share: Which type of learning do you feel is the hardest to develop in students? Motor Skills—Ability to learn and develop a ‘plan’ for carrying out specific sequence of physical movements (Gredler, 2009) Attitude—Can develop as positive or negative Determines how likely or unlikely one is to perform a specific task. Also determines how likely students are to participate within a given subject area (i.e. A student who has a negative attitude towards math) Teachers will think-pair-share about the type of learning most difficult to develop. Why? What makes it the most difficult?

Nine Events of Instruction What are they? How do they fit into a lesson design plan? One Light Bulb Expert Coming Up!

Nine Events of Instruction 1. Gain your students attention Provides students with a stimulus to gain their attention Ask thought-provoking questions Encourage students to develop questions to ask of each other Utilize the element of surprise or unknown. Pose question: “Why is it important to engage students prior to beginning the learning process?” Ways to gain attention: YouTube video Thought-provoking question Introduce a scenario or problem Current news event

Nine Events of Instruction 2. Inform students of the objectives Gives students opportunity to understand what they will be expected to learn State the objectives before the instruction takes place Why is it important for students to know what they will be expected to learn? Objectives must include: What materials will be provided What cognitive level students will be expected to perform at (knowledge, understanding, application, analysis, synthesis, evaluation) How will students show mastery of this skill To what accuracy students will be expected to master stated object Sample Objective Given math manipulatives and work mats, the learner will analyze the features of shapes by sorting the given shapes according to attributes with 95% accuracy. Think-Pair-Share: What needs to be present in a well-written objective?

Nine Events of Instruction 3. Stimulate the recall of prior knowledge This event aids students in making connections to new information by relating it to prior knowledge. Questions about prior experiences Relate previous concepts Activating prior knowledge helps students to make connections to the new information This can be done by asking questions about a previous concept or experience. Important to remember that different students will have different prior experiences. Think-pair-share: Give one example of a method you used to activate prior knowledge.

Nine Events of Instruction 4. Present the content Use of differentiated instructional strategies Organization in a meaningful way is essential When utilizing demonstrations, it is important to provide explanations. Ideas for introducing material include: Introducing vocabulary Giving examples Teaching the content in a variety of ways (lecture, small group work, video, written, demonstration) Utilize different types of media

Nine Events of Instruction 5. Provide learning guidance Providing learning guidance gives students strategies to help when learning the material Methods include: Providing instructional support Using examples and non-examples Demonstrate different strategies for learning Provide necessary instructional support Use as scaffolds for learning to be used while practicing and learning desired skill Examples might be hints, visual cues, songs, or rhymes Use examples and non-examples Frayer model can be used for key terms; definition, facts/characteristics, examples, non-examples Demonstrate different strategies for learning Strategies might include: visualizing, creating concept maps, acting out, utilizing think-pair-share, questioning

Nine Events of Instruction 6. Elicit Performance Guided practice assists students in internalizing the new information. Ideas for activities that elicit performance Student collaboration Higher level questioning Higher level thinking activities Utilizing real-world applications Guided practice Helps students internalize learning Gives teachers a chance to observe any misunderstandings students might have of concepts. Student collaboration allows for deeper understanding of material Higher level questioning—not yes/no questions, but questions that force students to use analytical skills to develop responses Higher level thinking activities—those activities that are not simply recalling information Creating Analyzing Comparing/contrasting Evaluating Real world applications—gives relevance to students. Concepts and skills that have little relevance to the student often affects his/her attitude about these concepts (and therefore, his/her ability to internalize these skills.)

Nine Events of Instruction 7. Provide feedback Teacher feedback gives students opportunity to correct misconceptions. Types of Feedback Confirmatory Corrective Remedial Informative Analytical Think-Pair-Share: What type of feedback do you use most often in your class? What are its benefits? Confirmatory Feedback—Tell the student what he/she did correctly Corrective Feedback—Tells the student how accurate his/her work was Remedial Feedback—Guides students in finding the correct answer but does not actually give it to them Informative Feedback—Gives ways for students to improve performance (not necessarily a correction for an incorrect answer; simply a way to improve) Analytical Feedback—Gives students suggestions for correcting incorrect responses

Nine Events of Instruction 8. Assess performance Assessment should be based on the objectives set at the beginning of lesson Assessment aids the teacher in revising the lesson and re-teaching as needed Types of assessment Pretest/post-test Formative Assessment Summative Assessment Assessment does not only take place at the end of the lesson. Assessment can and should happen throughout the lesson cycle Types of assessment Pretest/Post-test—Allows teachers to see what students already know (to maximize the effectiveness of the lesson) and what they have learned as a result of instruction Formative Assessment—Formative assessment should occur throughout lesson to gauge which students have mastered the desired skills and which students need further instruction (reteaching). Examples of formative assessment include: Questioning Teacher observation Class discussion Peer reviews Quizzes Summative Assessment—This is an end-of-unit exam that assesses a student’s mastery of the concept. Examples include: End-of-unit exams State testing (STAAR)

Nine Events of Instruction 9. Enhance retention and transfer to the job Aids students in truly internalizing the skills learned. Lateral transfer—ability to apply learning to new situations In order to enhance lateral transfer, many opportunities must be given to practice skills in a different context. Utilize skill in a different subject area Apply skill in a real-life setting

Practice Using Gagné’s Nine Events of Instruction, work with your table group to create an effective lesson of your choice. Explain how you will incorporate each of Gagné’s Nine Events into your lesson cycle. Table groups work together. Each table will develop a lesson using all Nine Events After 15-20 minutes, groups will share their lessons with the whole group.

Conclusion Ticket Out Identify one thing you have learned about Gagné and/or his Nine Events of Instruction. Identify one method/idea that you would like to include in your current lesson plan cycle this year. Hand out note cards As an exit ticket, teachers will answer the questions to reflect on their own lesson planning.

References Amriez, S. [Shaqiss Enamenamenam]. (2013, May 21). Gagne’s Instructional Events. [Video file]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZKe4Og5j9Xs Denton, Jon J.; Armstrong, David G.; Savage, Tom V. Matching Events of Instruction to Objectives. Theory Into Practice. Winter80, Vol. 19 Issue 1, p10-15. Gredler, Margaret. (2009). Learning and Instruction: Theory into Practice. Columbus, Ohio: Pearson. Northern Illinois University. (n.d). Gagné’s Nine Events of Instruction. Retrieved from http://www.niu.edu/facdev/resources/guide/ Recker, M. (1996). Robert Mills Gagne’s Biography. Retrieved from http://itls.usu.edu/