Creating a BOPPPPS Lesson Plan

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Effective lesson planning is the greatest tool in your teaching toolkit. In this teaching tip, learn about the BOPPPS Lesson Plan, and find downloadable resources to help you apply this strategy in for face-to-face and remote lesson delivery. BOPPPPS is adapted from the ISW Network (2021).

BOPPPPS

Map with a number of travel items, including a camera, coffee, pipe, magnifying glass, shoes, etc.
Photo by ian dooley on Unsplash

The lesson plan is the “travel guide” or “road map” to the lesson that you deliver in class. It contains the structure, sequence, and materials needed to get from the beginning to the end of the lesson. Use an intentional structure, like the BOPPPPS model, to help navigate this journey.

Understanding The BOPPPPS Method

Effective lesson planning gives you the chance to document and revise lessons, improving as you go. BOPPPPS is a trusted lesson planning approach to engage learners, increase retention, and promote active learning. There are 6 main parts of the BOPPPPS model, described below. (Some versions separate presentation and interactive practice.)

Bridge-In

Grab attention. Use a video, audio clip, or a personal anecdote relevant to the topic to arouse students’ interest in the topic. Rosegard & Wilson (2013) show that using a “hook” can greatly increase student retention of material.

Outcomes

Be obvious. Use concrete statements like “By the end of today’s class, we will have analyzed the messages in a variety of commercials.” Anderson, Hunt, Powell, and Dollar (2013) found that using statements like these helped students to better understand the purpose of the class. This resulted in motivation to “put in more effort” and work more “efficiently.”

Pre-Assessment

Test the waters. Being able to gauge how new learning relates to what students know already is important. McClelland (2013) showed that deliberately activating prior learning with a few pre-questions can be very helpful. This is a great opportunity to try a Mentimeter or Padlet activity in your classroom. Don’t focus on what the ‘strongest’ students know or can do, but try to focus on what most learners seem to understand. If there are large gaps in the general knowledge in the classroom, this pre-assessment gives you the chance to address these immediately.

Present New Material

This is your chance to share your knowledge and skills. You are the reason students show up to class, after all! “The lecturer’s presentation makes things human, quirky and interesting; makes it worth doing,” (Wood, Joyce, Petocz, & Rodd, 2007). Find ways to ensure your lesson delivery is engaging and reflects your content expertise.

Participatory Learning

Presentation and interactive practice combines a combination of faculty-led instruction through new content, and practice and participation by students.

Provide opportunities for practice and active engagement throughout. Try out some innovative active learning strategies. In an experimental study of three designs for one marketing course, Black, Daughtrey, & Lewis (2014) found that “active learning designs are likely to be more effective than traditional passive designs. In many cases, …traditional lecture design produces outcomes that are statistically inferior to those of active learning designs.”

Post-Assessment

This is your chance to get some formative assessment. Use it to demonstrate to yourself and to the class that learning has occurred, and to what extent. Ask questions using Mentimeter or do a brief practice quiz in eConestoga. This is another chance to correct any misunderstandings students may have, either before the end of class or at the beginning of next class, to activate prior learning.

Summary

Have a clincher. “A strong and powerful ending often stays clearly in the students’ minds,” yet Cheng (2012) found that few professors provide a rich ending. Many teachers find themselves out of time and stop suddenly. Try a memorable quote, an overall conclusion, a student testimonial, or an image that sums up the learning.

References

Anderson, A. D., Hunt, A. N., Powell, R. E., & Dollar, C. B. (2013). Student Perceptions of Teaching Transparency. The Journal of Effective Teaching, 13(2), 38-47.

Black, G. S., Daughtrey, C. L., & Lewis, J. S. (2014). The Importance of Course Design on Classroom Performance of Marketing Students. Marketing Education Review, 24(3), 213-226.

Cheng, S. W. (2012). “That’s it for today”: Academic lecture closings and the impact of class size. English For Specific Purposes, 31234-248.

DiVall, M. V., Alston, G. L., Bird, E., Buring, S. M., Kelley, K. A., Murphy, N. L., & … Szilagyi, J. E. (2014). A Faculty Toolkit for Formative Assessment in Pharmacy Education. American Journal Of Pharmaceutical Education, 78(9), 1-9.

ISW Network. (2021). Instructional Skills Workshop Network. www.iswnetwork.ca.

McClelland, J. L. (2013). Incorporating rapid neocortical learning of new schema-consistent information into complementary learning systems theory. Journal Of Experimental Psychology: General, 142(4), 1190-1210.

Rosegard, E., & Wilson, J. (2013). Capturing Students’ Attention: An Empirical Study. Journal Of The Scholarship Of Teaching And Learning, 13(5), 1-20.

Wood, L. N., Joyce, S., Petocz, P., & Rodd, M. (2007). Learning in lectures: multiple representations. International Journal Of Mathematical Education In Science & Technology, 38(7), 907-915.

Kathryn Brillinger

Kathryn is the Director of Teaching and Learning at Conestoga, bringing more than 30 years of teaching experience in the Ontario college system, specializing in English as a Second Language learning, diversity and intercultural skills. Internationally, she has presented on the impact of nonverbal cues on communication endeavours, and solving teaching and intercultural dilemmas. Kathryn holds an M.Ed., and certificates in TESL and Intercultural Studies. Contact Kathryn to discuss suggestions regarding potential programming for Teaching and Learning.

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