Lesson Planning Apps are the topic of our blog post today!
As teachers and educators, lesson planning is one of the key pedagogical practices that inform our instructional practice. Thankfully, gone are the days when everything has to be done the traditional way: pen and paper. Technology has now facilitated the whole process enabling teachers to cut down classroom prep time and, instead, focus on creating hands-on learning experiences for students.
There is now a wide variety of online lesson planners and pre-made lesson plan templates that teachers can draw on to create their own lessons. There are also mobile apps that allow teachers to create, edit and share their lessons on the go. A sample of these mobile apps are included below. These are some of most popular lesson plan apps out there.
Lesson planning apps
Here are some of our favourite lesson planning apps out there:
1. Planboard
Planboard is a good lesson planning app for teachers. It allows them to easily organize their lessons and subjects in visually appealing timetables accessible on the go. Teachers can use Planboard to create and edit lesson plans the way they want.
They can also add photos, files, and videos to bring their lessons to life and sync everything with their Planboard account on the web. Planboard offers standards progression tool that enables teachers to keep track of curriculum progress for each class and learn about standards that have been covered.
Compatibility: iPhone/iPad and Android / Price: Free / Age: 4+
2. Planbook
Planbook is another good lesson planning app for teachers. Teachers can select from different lesson layouts and attach videos, images, links, assignments, and assessments to their lessons. They can also use the site’s repository to add learning standards and differentiate teaching strategies.
Other important features provided by Planbook include the ability to create ‘team lesson banks for full curriculum management’, control who can view lesson sections, allow substitutes to view lesson details and add instructional details for them, create seating layouts and charts for students, track students attendance, integrate your plans with Google Classroom and Google Drive, and many more.
Compatibility: iPhone/iPad and Android / Price: Free, offers in-app purchases / Age: 4+
3. Nearpod
Nearpod is a web tool and mobile app that offers a wide variety of interactive tools that enable you to create engaging lessons for your students. More specifically, Nearpod allows you to create interactive media rich lessons, videos, games and learning activities.
Alternatively, you can use the site’s library to search for pre-designed standards-aligned lessons, videos, and activities and integrate them in your instructional practice. There are over 7000 customizable K-12 lessons to browse through. Lessons target various grades and subjects from ALA and math to social studies and computer science.
Nearpod also provides various types of formative assessments that help you get real-time insights into your students learning. “You can create and import your own Google Slides, Powerpoint of PDF lessons in minutes and add interactive activities”.
Compatibility: iPhone/iPad and Android / Price: Free, offers in-app purchases / Age: 4+
4. Educreations
Educreations is an interactive whiteboard and screencasting app that teachers can use to create engaging lesson plans. Educreations offers a host of interactive features that make it easy for any teacher to “annotate, animate, and narrate any type of content”.
You can handwrite or draw and record your voice to add as voice-over. You can also import images, documents, and presentations and use them in your lessons. Everything you create is automatically backed to the cloud allowing you unrestricted access anywhere with Internet connection.
Other interesting features provided by Educreations include the ability to create classes and invite students to join and access your lessons, the ability to control who can view what, provide written and audio feedback on students work, animate lessons with beautiful drawings and illustrations, save unfinished drafts of your lessons to complete later on, and many more.
Compatibility: iPhone/iPad / Price: Free, offers in-app purchases / Age: 4+
5. ShowMe
ShowMe allows you to create engaging educational whiteboard tutorials to share with your students. Like Educreations, ShowMe provides you with various interactive tools to bring your lessons to life including: the ability to record and add voice-over, drag and drop images into your lessons, draw to illustrate key points in the lesson, import documents and create videos out of them, unlimited lesson length and many more.
ShowMe premium offers way more features such as the ability to create study groups, annotate documents to share with members of the group, search and import photos from the web, download video content, create unlimited courses, create student accounts, and many more.
Compatibility: iPhone/iPad / Price: Free, offers in-app purchases / Age: 4+
Final thoughts
The evolution of technology has significantly streamlined lesson planning for educators, offering a range of digital tools that enhance efficiency and creativity. This post highlights some of the best lesson planning apps, each with unique features to assist teachers in organizing and enriching their instructional practice.
Planboard, for instance, helps in organizing lessons with visually appealing timetables and curriculum tracking tools. Planbook allows for comprehensive lesson customization with multimedia integrations and full curriculum management. Nearpod stands out with its interactive, media-rich lesson creation capabilities, including a vast library of pre-designed lessons.
Educreations offers an interactive whiteboard experience, enabling teachers to annotate, animate, and narrate educational content effectively. Lastly, ShowMe provides interactive tools for creating whiteboard tutorials, enhancing lesson engagement. These apps not only reduce the time spent on lesson preparation but also open doors to innovative teaching methods, allowing teachers to focus more on delivering hands-on, interactive learning experiences that resonate with students in today’s digital age.
