Quick Lessons
Fun quick lesson plan ideas are useful in an emergency. These simple flexible lesson plans & games are inclusive to children with special educational needs.
The inclusion in mainstream classes of children with special educational needs such as autism, ADHD, language impairments, pervasive developmental disorders, dyslexia and dyspraxia, has become far more common in recent years. For such children, unexpected changes in classroom routine can be daunting.
Even the best prepared of teachers is sometimes called upon to teach an unexpected lesson at short notice. These simple lesson plan ideas are based on familiar scenarios that will be accessible to all children, and involve a variety of activity types including kinaesthetic, oral and visual. They need the minimum of resources and no preparation.
Whether you are a teacher at a special needs school, or a mainstream teacher with special needs children in your class, these fun quick lesson plan ideas are designed to be as inclusive as possible.
Emergency lesson plan activities for inclusive classrooms
• Card Making – Discuss why we send cards and get examples. Discuss images. Get everyone to say who they would send a card to and why. Design and make the card. Can be done by hand or on a computer.
• News Time – Everyone takes turns saying what they did at the weekend (can be done in adult led groups). Encourage others to ask questions to elicit details. Do an oral quiz afterwards “Who did what?” Write about/draw your favourite weekend activity. Or present your weekend news as a newspaper headline and picture. By hand or on a computer.
• Creative Memory games – Play “I went to the shop and I bought…”. Each child has to add an item in alphabetical turn, and remember and say everyone else’s previous items in order when it’s their turn. At the end, try drawing all the items, or putting all the items into a short story.
• Drama Time – The teacher and 2 pupils model a roleplay where a child or teen is trying to persuade her parents to let her do/have something they don’t want her to. Model two outcomes – one a compromise, one a conflict. Get the class to do their own compromise and conflict roleplays based on a similar scenario, in groups of 3. Watch each others’ roleplays.
These one-off lessons can also be extended into a series of lessons if necessary. In addition to these plans, there are a number of games that can be played at any time with little or no preparation.
Quick interactive fun kinaesthetic games to use in inclusive lessons
These games can be used as ten minute “fillers,” but are often so popular the class will want to play them all lesson. The kinesthetic games can be used to provide movement breaks in the lesson for children with sensory integration problems, but will be appreciated by all! The games can be factored into the lesson or used as a “reward” activity at the end. Some of them may require access to a gym.
• Hangman
• I-spy
• Wink murder
• Musical Statues
• Musical Chairs
• Pictionary
• Fizz buzz
• Simon says
• Port and Starboard
• Dodgeball (soft balls only)
Inclusive classroom strategies and lesson plans benefit all pupils
These simple fun lesson plan ideas are designed to be accessible to all pupils. With an unfamiliar teacher, room, lesson plan or set of resources, a child with special educational needs may well become anxious about being unable to conform to the teacher’s expectations.
Whether you are teaching a child with ADHD, autism, language impairments, a pervasive developmental disorder, dyslexia or dyspraxia, these one-off emergency lesson plans are designed to promote flexibility and choice within a familiar context, hopefully reducing anxiety, and leading to a fun lesson.