How to Make a Lesson Plan with the Present, Practice​ Produce Method

What is PPP?

So you may have heard about or even learned about the Present, Practice, Produce (PPP) method. I’m not going to go into detail on that method here, but if you want more information about the actual PPP Method GO HERE. What I want to show you is how the heck do you apply it to an actual lesson plan!

 I’ve been teaching ESL/EFL and mentoring teachers for a number of years and the Present, Practice, Produce method for me is the easiest most effective method for planning my classes.

This post is going to take you through the basics of PPP and provide you with actual examples for each section of the PPP method. I want you to understand the method and also be able to effectively apply it to your own lesson planning.

To do that I am going to provide you with 2 things:

1. A step-by-step guide to the PPP method using an example lesson plan for the grammar point: past simple.
2. A simple downloadable PPP Lesson plan template that you can use to plan your own lesson. (Click here to get it RIGHT NOW!)

Using the PPP method to make a lesson plan

Confession time, I love teaching grammar, I am a grammar nerd and teaching tenses in my class is my all-time favourite thing to do!

I’m going to give you a fail-safe way to plan a great lesson using the PPP method that you can use anytime to plan any kind of lesson you want. I even have a Lesson Planning Template that you can use to guide you through the process! You will be a lesson planning master in no time!

Now, I would love to say that I came up with the PPP method for lesson planning…but alas I didn’t. It has been a tried and true lesson planning method in English Language teaching for some time!

So without further ado…let’s get down to business.

What is Present, Practice, Produce

Present

This is the introductory part of the lesson where the teacher does most of the “teaching”. Take this time to introduce the language point you are teaching that day. So for example, if you were teaching the grammar point for past simple, you would take this part of the class to teach the past simple tense the form and function. How you do this is up to you!

TIP: Try to introduce the grammar point using a warm-up question or activity that would make the students “use” the grammar. This will allow you to see how much your students know (or don’t know) about the grammar point. 

The Present part of my PPP lesson plan would look like something like this:

Practice

This is the part of the lesson where the students do a more controlled practice exercise like a worksheet or listening or reading activity. Choose or create an activity where students need to complete a structured exercise practicing the formation and usage of the language point. This could be a fill-in-the-blank exercise or word order activity of some sort.

For example, for past simple, to make sure that the students understand how to form a sentence using past tense verbs I would have a simple worksheet for them to complete, or I would have them re0organize sentences from a reading text. They would need to put the words in the correct order to make the correct past simple sentences.

TIP: Make sure once they have completed the exercise to check the answers as a class and address the different contexts they can use the language point in.

For past simple, I would ask the students what each sentence is about to help them recognize WHEN to use the past tense in conversation. (To talk about past events that are finished and happen at one specific moment in time)

My sample lesson plan would look something like this:

Produce

This is the final activity where students have the chance to be a little more creative in using the skill they have been taught. The activity can be speaking or writing where students are actually “producing” (see what I did there?) something using the skill they have just been practicing.

Back to our good friend past simple. For the final activity students could complete a survey using past simple questions. Students ask the same questions to 3-4 other classmates and write down their answers.

Example survey Questions:

1.) What did you eat for breakfast today?

2.) What was your favourite food when you were young?

3.) What was your least favourite food?

4.) Who was your favourite celebrity growing up?

You get the idea….basically any question that elicits the use of a past tense sentence.

TIP: Try to make the questions interesting for your class!

Following the lesson plan I have been showing you, here is a sample lesson plan for the survey activity:

For an example of a survey activity go to my post: How to Completely Change your Grammar Lesson with this Simple Activity.

Ending the Lesson

The final 5 – 10 minutes of a class should be used for providing feedback (correcting any mistakes from the activities), answering any final questions, checking that they have understood the grammar point and providing homework.

TIP: Make sure the homework allows the students to practice the grammar point in another similar context. See the example of my lesson: