Session 6: Final Project — Deliver a Lesson

Preparation is not memorising; it is knowing the material well enough to abandon the plan. The teacher who has memorised a script falls apart at the first question that is not in it, while the one who understands the material deeply can go somewhere unexpected and bring the class back. Prepare the structure and the key transitions, not the sentences.

Then prepare the room before the class, not during it. Test the microphone, the camera, the screen share and the recording twenty minutes early, with the actual files open and notifications disabled. Most teaching disasters are not pedagogical — they are four minutes of 'can everyone see my screen?' while the class's attention drains away, and every one of them is preventable.

And prepare for the three things that will happen: someone will not be able to hear you, someone will ask a question you cannot answer, and the timing will be wrong. Have an answer for each. 'Let us check audio before we start' handles the first. 'I do not know — I will find out and tell you on Tuesday' handles the second, and handles it better than guessing. The third is handled by knowing in advance what you will cut.

The first two minutes set the whole lesson. Open with what they will be able to do, not with housekeeping or an apology for the technology. 'By the end of today you will be able to total any column and handle the blanks that break most formulas' gives the class a reason to pay attention that housekeeping does not.

Then manage the room continuously, which is the skill that separates teaching from presenting. Watch the chat, watch the faces, and notice silence — online, silence usually means confusion rather than understanding, because people are reluctant to admit being lost in front of others. Ask specific questions with specific answers rather than 'any questions?', and call on people gently by name, because a class nobody is called on is a class nobody is in.

The central discipline is adjusting rather than performing. If the class is confused, go back — the plan is a hypothesis and the class is the evidence. If they have already got it, move faster rather than repeating yourself out of loyalty to the timings. The teacher who completes the plan while the class is lost has not taught anything, however well the plan was executed.

Record the lesson, because watching yourself is the fastest improvement available and also the most avoided. Announce that you are recording — consent matters, and it may be legally required under Nigeria's data protection framework — and verify the file saved afterwards, because a missing recording is unrecoverable.

Then watch it, which is genuinely uncomfortable, and watch for four specific things rather than generally. Where did you lose them? Watch for the moment attention drops; it is usually visible and it is usually the same cause each time. How much did you talk versus them? Most first lessons are ninety per cent teacher, and the ratio is the single most useful number there is. What did you say twice? Repetition is usually a sign the first explanation did not land and you sensed it. Where did the technology cost you time? Every minute is a minute not spent teaching.

The instinct is to watch for how you looked and sounded, and that is the least useful thing to examine. Watch what the class did, because that is the only measure of whether teaching happened. A lesson where you felt awkward and the class produced correct work is a success; one where you felt fluent and nobody could do the task is not.

Peer feedback is the most valuable thing in this session and the hardest to receive well. The rule is simple: record it, do not respond to it. The instinct to explain what you meant, or to point out the constraint the critic missed, costs you exactly the information you came for, and it makes the next person less honest.

Then sort the notes afterwards into three. Genuinely wrong — the audio was inaudible, the objective was never stated, the exercise was unclear. These must change. Preference — 'I would have gone slower', 'I prefer fewer slides'. Worth considering, not obligatory. The critic's own situation — they teach adults and you taught beginners, they are comfortable with silence and you are not. Note it and move on.

When you give feedback, be specific and be about the work. 'I lost the thread at about minute eight when the explanation became abstract' is useful. 'It was good' helps nobody, and 'you need to be more confident' is unactionable and unkind in the way that vagueness is unkind. Name what worked as well — knowing what to keep matters as much as knowing what to change, and feedback that is only negative produces someone who changes everything rather than improving what exists.

The plan turns feedback into change, and it works only if it is specific and small. 'Get better at pacing' is not a plan. 'Check the chat every ten minutes and stop when someone looks lost' is, because it can be done in the next lesson and you can tell whether you did it.

Pick two changes, not seven. A lesson where you attempt seven improvements gets worse, because attention is finite and teaching already demands most of it. Choose the two that address the biggest problems the feedback identified, write them where you will see them during the lesson, and check afterwards whether you actually did them.

Then the honest expectation about teaching. The first lesson is always worse than the plan, because the plan does not include the questions, the confusion, the technology and the time you actually had. That is not failure; it is what teaching is. The teachers who improve are the ones who deliver, record, review and adjust repeatedly, and the ones who do not are usually those who decided the first attempt proved they were not suited to it. It did not prove that. It proved they had taught once.