Effectiveness of Lesson Planning: Factor Analysis

The paper presents the conceptual framework that guided the development of the Lesson Plan Evaluation Rubric (LPER) instrument derived from the Four Stages of Lesson Planning (FSLP) strategy and the empirical results that provide the insight into the elements of lesson planning. Teachers from urban low-performing middle schools in one of the New England states received training and ongoing coaching in the FSLP strategy. Two hundred sixty one lesson plans from 39 teachers were collected during one school year of the two-year study to conduct factor analysis of the Rubric's 17 items. The resulting four factors are discussed in this paper. The research shows that the lessons plans developed with the reference to the FSLP strategy revealed a higher degree of lesson coherence. (Contains 2 figures and 1 table.)