Teaching Adults Learning Experience Plan and Analysis: Leadership Lesson Plan

Context  

Leadership is a vital skill for students to learn and develop. Given that students get exposed to a work environment after graduation, they need to be prepared for any leadership roles assigned to them. The lesson will focus on key leadership concepts that students need to understand. This will be a one hour lesson that will take place in Lecture Room 1. Before attending this lesson, students will be required to have watched the leadership documentary. 

Learner Analysis   

This lesson is intended for final year college students. The students range from 20-25 years. The class consists of a diverse racial and cultural background. Given the students' age, the lesson has to be lively. Most students in their early twenties prefer exciting and interactive classroom sessions instead of dull and boring ones ( Asadipiran, 2016) . Therefore, the experience will have to involve a discussion. This discussion will keep the session lively. Students in this range also get easily distracted during lessons ( Asadipiran, 2016) . Therefore, the instructor will have to frequently ask questions during the lesson to keep the students engaged. 

Objectives 

The main objective of this lesson is for students to understand the basic concepts of leadership. The objectives of this lesson are as follows: 

Students will be able to define leadership. 

Students will be able to identify the principles of effective leadership. 

Students will be able to understand the essential qualities and skills for effective leadership. 

Students will be able to use their viewing skills to understand and interpret film clips. 

Students will be able to write a leadership analysis of a prominent leader or someone they interact with in their daily lives. 

Activities 

Activity 1 

The instructor will facilitate a class discussion for seven minutes. In this discussion, students will give different definitions of leadership, identify various principles of effective leadership, and identify various leadership skills and qualities. The discussion will assist students in understanding what leadership skills, qualities, and principles are. 

Activity 2 

For this activity, students should have watched the leadership documentary (Secrets of Leadership: Churchill – The Best Documentary Ever). Students will undertake this activity in class for thirteen minutes. Students will write down the qualities, skills, or abilities that they believe made Winston Churchill a successful leader. Working with a partner, students will identify five to ten qualities/skills of an effective leader. The pairs will then share their identified attributes until all lists are exhausted. The class will then identify the overall top five to ten leadership traits of an effective leader. This activity will enable learners to comprehend the skills that go into effective leadership. 

Activity 3 

The third activity will be a discussion of student observations and supporting evidence from the coursebook and handout.    

Assessments 

Students will produce a written leadership analysis of someone they interact with in their daily lives, or a prominent leader. This will be done outside class during students. The written leadership analysis will be submitted one day after the lesson. Through this written analysis, students will demonstrate their comprehension of leadership principles, skills, and qualities. Students will do the assignment individually. 

Learning Theories/Instructional Models Used  

Humanism is a learning theory that focuses on human potential, dignity, and freedom. Humanism assumes that people act with values and intentionality ( Pritchard, 2017) . This is different from the behaviorism theory, which argues that all learning behaviors result from the application of consequences, and the cognitive belief that constructing meaning or discovering knowledge is central to learning. Humanism directs student-centered instruction for this lesson. The educator is only a facilitator. 

The development of instruction for this course is also based on the connectivism theory. This learning theory explains how technology advancements have created new opportunities for students to share information and learn from the internet ( Pritchard, 2017) . These internet technologies include social networks, online discussion forums, YouTube, web browsers, and emails. The connectivism theory has guided the selection of the YouTube video from which students are expected to learn about leadership skills and qualities. 

Implementation 

The following materials and resources will be needed to implement the learning objectives. 

Internet – Students will need internet to access the YouTube Video 

Coursebook 

Handout - Leadership 

Pens and books – These materials will be required for writing notes and performing the second activity. 

The lesson will be one hour long. I will evaluate my effectiveness as an educator in two ways. First, I will create a survey for the students to examine their learning experience and my teaching. Secondly, I will mark the written leadership analyses by the students. The scores by the students will indicate how effective my teaching was. 

Physical Space Analysis 

The lesson will take place in Lecture Room 1. For this lesson, I will only need a whiteboard marker, which will assist in making explanations, illustrations, and writing down some of the main points. For this lesson, the traditional large classroom arrangement will be used. The arrangement will make it easy for all students to see the whiteboard. Also, the arrangement makes it easy for an instructor to see all students. During the second activity, the students might have to sit in pairs. This arrangement will enable them to discuss in twos on the leadership aspects of the documentary. A discussion by two students cannot be conducted without them sitting together. 

Potential Issues 

The learning experience might face several issues. First, the students at the back might not hear the educator clearly. As a result, student participation might drop off toward the back of the lecture room. This challenge will be addressed by using amplified sound. Before the lecture, there will be a need to organize sound backup. Sound backup will ensure that the educator is audible, which will, in turn, make all students concentrate. With all students concentrating, I expect all students to be active during the classroom discussion. 

The normal classroom arrangement might also limit visibility for the students at the back. These students might be blocked from seeing the whiteboard by those in front of them. This challenge can be addressed by using a smart board. A smart board is larger and brighter than a conventional whiteboard. Therefore, it will be clearly visible to all students in the lecture room. Perhaps, the lesson would be better conducted in the smart board room.   

Another potential problem is the disruption caused by the students' adjustment from the regular classroom arrangement to the discussion arrangement and back. If the adjustment is disorderly, there might be unnecessary noise and time wastage. To address, this I will encourage students to move in an orderly manner and avoid disorder. 

Finally, some students may not be able to access the documentary on YouTube. Since this is a necessity for the students to take this lesson, I will organize with the computer lab assistants to make the lab available to the students before the lesson. 

Appendices 

Activities 

Briefly introduce the students to the topic of leadership for around five minutes. 

For approximately seven minutes, facilitate a class discussion. Ask a few students to define leadership, state what they think are the necessary leadership qualities, skills, and qualities of effective leadership. Take notes on the whiteboard to capture student ideas on the skills and qualities that they believe define a good leader. Can the students think of people who have these traits? Ask them to name some of these people and provide evidence to back up their opinions. 

Tell students that they are going to discuss the documentary they watched earlier on YouTube in pairs. The documentary is titled "Secrets of Leadership: Churchill – The Best Documentary Ever". The link to the video is  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DmqrDVHMTGY . Direct the students to sit in pairs and work with their partners to write down five to ten leadership skills they identified from the video that they believe made Winston Churchill a successful leader. This activity will take around thirteen minutes. After the students have identified the skills and qualities, ask the pairs to share their identified leadership skills, qualities, and traits, until they are all exhausted. Write the identified leadership skills, qualities, and traits on the board. Ask the students to identify the top five to ten qualities of an effective leader from the list. 

Discuss student observations from the documentary based on evidence from the textbook and handout. Discuss leadership, leadership qualities, skills, and principles of effective leadership. This will be the longest activity during the lesson. Summarize the main points from the discussion on the whiteboard.   

Ask the students to write a leadership analysis of either a prominent leader or someone in their daily lives. The written leadership analysis will be submitted on the next day. 

Assessments 

Students will be assessed on 

Classroom contributions. 

Keen observation of the video and the ability to support evidence with claims from the textbook or handout. 

Content and mechanics of the written leadership analysis. 

The prompt for the written leadership analysis will be "Identify one famous leader or someone you interact with in your daily life. Analyze his/her leadership, addressing the qualities, skills, and traits that define their leadership. Identify the principles of leadership that this person/leader uses to lead effectively. Also, reflect on possible failures in the person's leadership." 

Tentative schedule 

The first five minutes of the lesson will be used to introduce the topic to the students briefly. We will then move into the classroom discussion, which will take seven minutes. After the classroom discussion, the students will take two and a half minutes to sit in pairs for the discussion. This discussion, together with the identification of the top five to ten top leadership skills, will go on for thirteen minutes. After the discussion, the students will take another two and a half minutes to move back to the normal sitting arrangement. I will then start my discussion of the students' observations based on facts from the textbook and handout for 25 minutes. We will discuss what leadership traits, qualities and principles Churchill used to be an effective leader. The last five minutes of the lecture will be used to respond to the students' questions, give the prompt for the assignment, and conclude the lesson. 

Teaching Evaluation 

The following survey will evaluate my strengths and weaknesses as an educator form the students' point of view. 

Teacher Evaluation Survey 

Teaching Approaches 

The educator roused my attentiveness in the lesson. 

Agree 

Neutral 

Disagree 

The instructor exercised time and pace management. 

Agree 

Neutral 

Disagree 

The instructor was prepared and ready for the lesson. 

Agree 

Neutral 

Disagree 

The instructor responded to questions and encouraged discussions. 

Agree 

Neutral 

Disagree 

The instructor was well knowledgeable of the subject. 

Agree 

Neutral 

Disagree 

The instructor was interested and enthusiastic. 

Agree 

Neutral 

Disagree 

The instructor used different teaching techniques to attain the lesson’s objectives (e.g. student presentations, group discussions, e.t.c.) 

Agree 

Neutral 

Disagree 

The instructor challenged learners to work hard. 

Agree 

Neutral 

Disagree 

Remarks (Teaching Approaches) 

Feedback and Assessment 

The instructor passed clear communication on the assessment. 

Agree 

Neutral 

Disagree 

The instructor provided feedback within the stated time frame. 

Agree 

Neutral 

Disagree 

Remarks (Assessment and Feedback)

Resources and Administration 

The instructor supported the lesson with library resources. 

Agree 

Neutral 

Disagree 

The instructor used blackboard resources for the lesson. 

Agree 

Neutral 

Disagree 

The instructor guided students on where to find the resources. 

Agree 

Neutral 

Disagree 

Remarks (Resources and Administration) 

Teaching Reflection 

Creating a learning experience is not just a systematic process. It is a creative process with clear outcomes. The best student learning experiences should be student-centered ( Courtney, 2018) . In other words, a good learning experience should focus on the active participation of students and the performance of learning tasks rather than the reception of the instructor's information and directions. 

For a good learning experience, the educator should not lead. Instead, he/she should only facilitate the learning process. This principle directs student-focused learning, where the focus of the class is on a more communal learning environment that enables students to be responsible for their education, rather than focusing on the educator as the sole source of knowledge. A good learning experience should also provide time for focused reflection and self-assessment ( Courtney, 2018) . At some point, group work should be included. Group work enables students to share their understanding, learn the understanding of other students, negotiate their opinions with each other, and develop newer understandings. A learning experience should also evaluate students through formative assessments. Assessments and evaluation provide the basis for the adaptation of learning experiences. 

Adults have unique learning requirements. Therefore effective adult educators need to understand these requirements to create effective learning experiences. Adults need to know the purposes, values, and benefits of a learning experience, failure to which they will exhibit reluctance to engage in the learning experience. Adult educators, therefore, need to identify a learning program's purposes, benefits, and values (Boyadjieva & Ilieva-Trichkova, 2017) . Additionally, adult educators should provide content that is meaningful and relevant to adult learners. This is because adults need to see how and why the content is vital to them and how it will apply to their lives. 

Adults prefer learning via direct experience (Boyadjieva & Ilieva-Trichkova, 2017) . Therefore learning and training intervention must include practical and active participation. The interventions should also offer methodologies and techniques that can be implemented to improve their daily lives. 

Finally, adult learners prefer involvement in the learning process. They need to have a sense of decision-making, control, and responsibility in the learning experience (Boyadjieva & Ilieva-Trichkova, 2017) . As a result, effective adult educators should plan for consultations and learner feedback. They should involve the learners in the learning process so that they can have some control over what they learn. 

My strength in adult education would be in providing relevant content to adult learners. On the other hand, I would struggle to give the learners some degree of control over what they learn since I prefer directing the learning experiences. As an educator, I struggle with giving my students control over what they learn. I prefer to dominate over the entire learning process and perceive any control by students as a sabotage of my authority over them. My thought on offering the learners some degree of control is that they would focus on unnecessary activities and content, which would not lead to the attainment of learning objectives. To address this problem, I would seek other educators' assistance in developing programs that give the learners some control while ensuring that they align with the objectives. Teaching adults involves teaching people with maturity and experiences. In a nutshell, teaching adults is easier than teaching children. 

References  

Asadipiran, N. (2016). Identifying young learners’ learning styles among Iranian EFL learners.  Theory and Practice in Language Studies ,  6 (7), 1444-1450. 

Boyadjieva, P., & Ilieva-Trichkova, P. (2017). Between inclusion and fairness: Social justice perspective to participation in adult education.  Adult Education Quarterly ,  67 (2), 97-117. 

Courtney, S. (2018).  Why adults learn: Towards a theory of participation in adult education . Routledge. 

Pritchard, A. (2017).  Ways of learning: Learning theories for the classroom . Routledge.