Worksheet#1_WS#2_Lesson Planning

Writing Lesson Objectives Effectively

Characteristics

1. Student-centered: Lesson objectives specify what the learner will be able to do rather than
specify what the teacher will do.

2. Observable and measurable: Lesson objectives describe behaviors that can be seen and
evaluated. Action verbs should be used.

3. Communicative: Lesson objectives should target the development of student communicative

competence rather than only target grammatical competence.

4. Thematic: Lesson objectives should relate to the lesson’s topic by specifically mention it in
each of them.

Note
1. There should be at least one objective per stage. This means that the
main activities in the presentation, practice and production stages
should have a minimum of one objective each.

2. Some OBSERVABLE verbs are: identify, explain, solve, sketch, compare,

contrast, describe, discuss, tell, write, create, elaborate, construct, etc.

3. The following verbs are NOT DIRECTLY OBSERVABLE; therefore they should not be used when
writing lesson objectives: understand, comprehend, learn, acquire, know, appreciate, feel,
believe, be aware, etc.

4. You can replace writing Students will be able to… by using the acronyms SWBAT.

Examples
Topic: The Weather
Objectives:
 SWBAT identify vocabulary related to the weather by matching pictures with their
corresponding word.
 SWBAT compare the weather in different seasons of the year.
 SWBAT draw their favorite kind of weather and explain why
they like it.

Topic: People
Objectives:
 SWBAT recognize adjectives that are used to describe people’s appearance and
personality.
 SWBAT describe people by using appropriate vocabulary and structure studied in this
lesson.
 SWBAT write a complete description of a famous person.