“Mircea cel Batran” Naval Academy Scientific Bulletin, Volume XIX – 2016 – Issue 2 The journal is indexed in: PROQUEST / DOAJ / Crossref / EBSCOhost / INDEX COPERNICUS / DRJI / OAJI / JOURNAL INDEX / I2OR / SCIENCE LIBRARY INDEX / Google Scholar / Academic Keys/ ROAD Open Access / Academic Resources / Scientific Indexing Services / SCIPIO / JIFACTOR PRACTICE DOESN'T MAKE PERFECT; PERFECT PRACTICE MAKES PERFECT Delia LUNGU 1 Laura CIZER 2 1 Associate Professor, PhD. Department of Navigation and Maritime and River Transport, Faculty of Navigation and Management, “Mircea cel Batran” Naval Academy, Constanta, Romania 2 Lecturer, PhD. Department of Electrical Engineering and Naval Electronics, Faculty of Marine Engineering, “Mircea cel Batran” Naval Academy, Constanta, Romania Abstract. Much has been discusses about the importance of writing a lesson plan; nevertheless, this topic will never be obsolete and good teachers will always consider the subject as an important issue in their teaching career. There are teachers who believe that writing a lesson plan is important just for young teachers who need to have a clear idea about what they are going to do in class, while writing a lesson plan by experienced teachers is a waste of time as they already have taught the subject lots of times and know exactly what they have to do about any topic. It has also been stated that not all planned lessons are excellent ones and not all unplanned lessons are a disaster, but even a bad lesson will be less bad if planned, and even a great lesson can be greater with a plan. The aim of this paper is to discuss the importance of writing lesson plans by analyzing the benefits of a good lesson plan and their impact on teachers’ development. The topic is also part of a series of sessions presented in teacher training seminars in which the authors have participated as trainers. Keywords: good versus poor lesson plan, common mistakes, teachers, students INTRODUCTION There is consistent evidence that teachers are still the most important school-based factor in determining learning outcomes, second only to what students bring to school. Preparing future teachers with the right skills is the core activity in teacher training in universities and colleges where future teachers should be equipped with subject knowledge and teaching and pedagogical skills, that can provide relevant guidance to promote effective practice and support improvement. Nevertheless, regardless of how well prepared the future teachers leave universities, once they start teaching, constant training should be provided to ensure that they stay up to date with the latest developments in the field of education, be it in the area of academic theory or advanced technology. Teacher training should be adjusted to the field of teaching and thus, the focus should be placed either on general or specialized English. Still, there are a few topics which are of general interest regardless of the specialization and, among them a key role is played by Lesson planning. There are different ways in which a session about how to write a good lesson plan can be designed. METHOD The model followed in this article is the one offered in a series of sessions presented in teacher training seminars in which the authors have participated as trainers. Furthermore, the model proposed will answer several questions with regard to why lesson plans should be written, it will try to underline some of the characteristics of good versus poor lesson plans, will discuss the components that have to be included in a good lesson plan and will end with some common mistakes done when writing a lesson plan. Why should lesson plans be written? There are several reasons which could answer this question and they take into account both the teacher and the students. A good lesson plan: • has a positive impact on both the teacher and the learner; • gives confidence to the teacher; • helps teachers to be clear about what they want to teach; • clarifies the teacher’s decisions about strategies and methods employed to help students advance systematically towards learning goals; • may play the role of a reminder for teachers when they get distracted; • frames the lesson giving it an overall shape; • builds on previous teaching and prepares for coming lessons; • structures the lesson and helps the students to better assimilate the new information; • helps teachers to keep track of what works and what does not work in class. 434 DOI: 10.21279/1454-864X-16-I2-065 © 2015. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 4.0 License.