Prompt: Build a Lesson Plan

Creates a timed lesson plan with a starter, main activity, independent task and plenary that fit exactly inside your lesson length.

The prompt

Open in Studio

You are an experienced classroom teacher who plans lessons that fit exactly inside the time given.

Objective: Produce a full lesson plan for {{TOPIC — e.g. photosynthesis}} for {{YEAR GROUP — e.g. Year 8}}, lasting {{LESSON LENGTH IN MINUTES — e.g. 50}} minutes.

Context: The lesson sits within a unit on {{UNIT OR TOPIC AREA — e.g. plant biology}}. Prior knowledge: {{PRIOR KNOWLEDGE — e.g. students know the basic parts of a plant cell}}.

Constraints:
- Structure the plan as exactly four timed sections, in this order: Starter, Main activity, Independent task, Plenary
- The minutes for the four sections must add up exactly to the total lesson length given above
- State exactly one learning objective and exactly one success criterion
- Include exactly one differentiation note for lower-attaining students and exactly one for higher-attaining students
- Do not invent curriculum standards, exam board references or statistics; if none are supplied, omit them

Example: for a 50-minute lesson, a common split is Starter 5, Main activity 20, Independent task 20, Plenary 5.

Output format: Return the plan as a Markdown table with exactly three columns — Section, Minutes, Activity — followed by the learning objective, success criterion and the two differentiation notes as a short list beneath the table.

Before finishing, check that the minutes in the table sum exactly to {{LESSON LENGTH IN MINUTES — e.g. 50}} and that no section has been added, removed or reordered.

Example

Input

TOPIC — e.g. photosynthesis: the water cycle
YEAR GROUP — e.g. Year 8: Year 5
LESSON LENGTH IN MINUTES — e.g. 50: 50
UNIT OR TOPIC AREA — e.g. plant biology: weather and climate
PRIOR KNOWLEDGE — e.g. students know the basic parts of a plant cell: students can already name the three states of water — solid, liquid and gas

Output

| Section | Minutes | Activity |
|---|---|---|
| Starter | 5 | Show a glass of iced water sweating on the outside; ask students in pairs to suggest where the droplets came from. |
| Main activity | 20 | Explain evaporation, condensation and precipitation using a labelled diagram of the water cycle, checking understanding with quick thumbs-up/thumbs-down questions after each stage. |
| Independent task | 20 | Students label a blank water cycle diagram and write one sentence per stage explaining what is happening and why. |
| Plenary | 5 | Cold-call three students to each explain one stage of the cycle in their own words; correct any misconceptions aloud. |

Learning objective: Students can explain, in their own words, how water moves between the sea, the air and the land.

Success criterion: A student's labelled diagram correctly names all three processes (evaporation, condensation, precipitation) in the right order.

Differentiation — lower-attaining: provide a partially labelled diagram with a word bank of the three process names.

Differentiation — higher-attaining: ask them to also explain what would happen to the cycle if average temperatures rose.

Why it works

Fixing the four sections and requiring the minutes to sum exactly to the lesson length stops a plan that looks complete but overruns the period.
Limiting the plan to one objective and one success criterion keeps the lesson focused instead of listing vague aspirational goals.
The pre-finish check re-verifies the minutes total, catching an arithmetic slip before the plan is used in class.

Why the basic version fails

“Write me a lesson plan on the water cycle” produces a plan with a random number of activities, no timings, or timings that don’t actually add up to the length of the period — you end up cutting the plenary short in real time because the plan was never checked against the clock.

What this prompt fixes

Fixing the plan to exactly four named sections, and requiring the minutes to sum to the given lesson length, means the plan is usable as written rather than needing mental rescheduling. Limiting the plan to one objective and one success criterion keeps the lesson from sprawling into several loosely related goals, and the two differentiation notes make sure both ends of the class are considered without turning the plan into a full differentiated scheme.

Tips per model

ChatGPT is good at generating engaging starter activities; check the timings it proposes actually sum correctly before trusting the table.
Claude tends to write more concise, classroom-realistic activity descriptions — useful when you’ll be reading from the plan while teaching.
If the lesson covers a topic with an established practical (e.g. a science experiment), paste the equipment list into the context field so the main activity accounts for setup and clear-down time.