Outcome
- Use a lesson-planning model to design a learning activity that integrates technology resources to support your teaching.
What is the ASSURE model?
In a nutshell, ASSURE stands for 6 steps in lesson design identified as:
Before we proceed, you may like to read more about the ASSURE model. Bear in mind that it is often used to describe e-learning lessons, but apply to classroom learning.
This short paper, The ASSURE Learning Model Lesson, will provide a simple summary.
A -Analyse learner
General Characteristics
This is a description of the class as a whole. This includes such information as the number of students, grade or age level, gender, socio-economic factors and cultural or other types of diversity.
Entry Competencies
This is a description of the types of knowledge expected of the learners. Ask questions such as: “Do the students…
- Do the students have the knowledge base required to enter the lesson?
- Do the students have the entry competencies and technical vocabulary for this lesson?
- Are the students competent in the skills you are expecting them to apply during the lesson?
- Do the students have biases or misconceptions about the topic?
Learning Styles:
This is a description of the learning style preferences of the members of the class. The main choices are auditory, visual, and tactile/kinesthetic. Students with learning challenges tend to prefer kinesthetic experiences. Also determine how students tend to approach the cognitive processing of information. Finally, determine the motivational and physiological factors of the students. When it comes to motivational factors you should consider things such as anxiety, degree of structure, achievement motivation, social motivation, cautiousness, and competitiveness. The most prominent influences in physiological factors are sexual differences, health, and environmental conditions.
S –State Outcomes
Objectives are descriptions aligned to the national curriculum outcomes and are written using the ABCD format.
- Audience: Name the learners for whom the outcome is intended.
- Behaviour: State what you want them to do. This learner performance is an observable and measurable action. You should therefore carefully select an action verb to describe this.
- Condition: State the circumstances or conditions under which the learners are to demonstrate the skill being taught. Include tools or refer to conditions under which the learners have to perform (if applicable).
- Degree: State the degree to which the new performance must be mastered (if applicable).
For example:
(A) The Drama class (B) will be able to identify and draw stage directions (C) using pencils and rulers (D) with 100% accuracy.
(A) The Foundation phase class (B) will identify the colors, red, green, and blue (C) using blocks (D) 9 times out of 10.
Use as many objective statements needed in order to meet the different outcomes for the lesson.
S Select methods, media and materials
In this section you build a bridge between the audience and the outcomes. You decide what method you will primarily use to lead learning (pedagogy), what media and resources you will use, including technology, and what other materials you will need to prepare. You may adopt several methods in the lesson and at first you may identify more resources than you will finally use. You are basically establishing what you have and what you will need to prepare in order for these students to achieve the objectives through the method you have chosen. Consider this checklist for media selection.
U Use the media and materials
For each type of media and/or materials you should describe in detail how you are going to implement them into your lesson to help your learners meet the lesson’s objective.
It almost goes without saying that you should include plans to:
- Prepare the material – make sure you have everything you need and that it all works.
- Prepare the environment – whatever you are doing will work in the space you have.
- Prepare the students – if the students need to use resources in a specific way or it requires a specific skill, how will you support this?
- Prepare for the worst – what is your Plan B if resources fail you?
R Require learner participation
Students learn best when they are actively involved in the learning experience. Whatever your teaching strategy, be sure to incorporate hands-on activities, discussions, group work, and other ways of getting students actively involved. Consider ways in which the students can use the technology resources to create expressions of the knowledge they have gained during the lesson. Refer to the potential activities of Webb’s Depth of Knowledge guide, specifically at Level 2 – Working with Skills and Concepts on page 9 and the level that follows that on page 11, Short-term Strategic Thinking.
Think about the various cognitive levels of activity in which students will be engaged during the lesson.
E Evaluate and Revise
There are two ways of looking at Evaluate and Revise:
- You assess your students and revise what they have not understood well,
- Evaluate and revise the lesson after you have taught it so next time it is more effective.
After the lesson, you must evaluate the entire learning experience. You must reflect upon the lesson, the stated outcomes, the learning strategy, the materials and the assessment. If there are discrepancies between what you intended and what actually happened during the lesson, make appropriate revisions before using the lesson again. This is not something you can include in your lesson plan, but what you should include is an assessment tool so you know whether your students have achieved the learning objectives of the lesson.
