Lesson Planner

It is a didactic design tool that organizes a class into its three main phases: introduction, development and closure. In each phase you can add activities with their type, duration and materials. A visual time bar shows in real time how the minutes are distributed among the three stages and alerts you if the total exceeds the planned class duration. It works for planning before teaching, for systematizing the structure of a learning sequence, or for documenting a class that has already been taught.

Yes, it is completely free and requires no account or installation. It works in the browser from a computer, tablet or phone. The plan is saved automatically in the browser while you work; you can come back to it without losing anything. If you want a permanent copy, export as PDF with the print button.

There are ten types available: Lecture (teacher presentation, direct instruction), Discussion (debate, sharing round), Individual (personal task or exercise), Group work (teamwork), Practice (drill, lab, workshop), Reading (text, worksheet or source), Video (audiovisual content screening), Assessment (quiz, self-evaluation, rubric), Game (playful activity or gamification) and Other for any activity not listed. Each type has a different icon for quick identification.

There is no universal rule, but some proportions work well depending on the pedagogical approach. A common distribution for a 60-minute class is: 10 min introduction (activating prior knowledge, presenting the objective), 40 min development (main content, practice, student work) and 10 min closure (synthesis, reflection, quick assessment). If the introduction is too short, students arrive disconnected from the topic; if closure is skipped, there is no opportunity to consolidate what was learned. The tool does not impose proportions: you decide how long each phase lasts based on the class purpose.

The introduction is the opening and activation stage. Its function is to connect students with the topic, activate prior knowledge and establish the class purpose. Typical introduction activities: a provocative question, a short image or video, an activation activity, a brainstorm, an anticipation organizer or a review of the previous class. In the Planner, the introduction phase appears in yellow to distinguish it visually from development and closure.

Development is the core of the class: this is where the main learning happens. It can include presenting new content, practice exercises, group work, source analysis, problem-solving or application activities. It is usually the longest phase and can have several chained activities. The Planner shows the accumulated development time in the top bar so you can see if it is taking up too much space or if time is left for the other phases.

The closure consolidates and closes the learning cycle. Common activities: an Exit Ticket with two or three synthesis questions, completing the L column of the KWL Chart, a comprehension vote with the Comprehension Stoplight, the I Used to Think, Now I Think organizer, or a reflection round where each student states something they learned. The closure should not be skipped even when time is short: five minutes of synthesis have a high impact on retention.

Yes. The print button in the top bar opens the browser dialog. There you choose Save as PDF without installing anything. The layout adapts to an A4 vertical page: the class title appears, followed by grade and duration data, the learning objective, the time bar and the three activity columns with all their details. It is useful for saving in your planning notebook, sharing with the teaching team or attaching to a portfolio.

Yes, the current plan is saved automatically in the browser's local storage. If you open the same tool again on the same device and browser, the plan appears exactly as you left it. What does not persist across devices or different browsers: if you worked in Chrome and open Firefox, you start from scratch. To keep the plan permanently or share it, export the PDF.

Yes. The introduction-development-closure structure applies to any area (Math, Language, Science, History, Art, Physical Education, etc.) and all levels (preschool, elementary, secondary, teacher education, university). Only the content of the activities and the duration of each phase change. At preschool level it can be used for 30-minute sequences with very brief activities; at secondary or university it can cover 90 or 120-minute classes with more extended development blocks.

The Planner works as the starting point: it defines the structure. Then each activity in the plan can be carried out with specific tools. For the introduction: Live Word Cloud, Topic Spinner or the Question Dice. For development: Collaborative Ideas Wall, Timeline or Venn Diagram. For closure: Exit Ticket, Comprehension Stoplight or I Used to Think, Now I Think.

The three-phase sequence has roots in multiple approaches. In Experiential Learning, the initial activation connects with the student's prior experience before constructing new understanding. In Visible Thinking, closing with reflection routines makes what was learned explicit. In models of direct instruction and active learning, the structure ensures the class has a complete cycle: anticipation, construction and consolidation.

The most solid starting point is the learning objective: before thinking about activities, define what you want students to be able to do, understand or demonstrate by the end of the class. With that clear objective, the closure almost designs itself (how do I verify it was achieved?), and development comes from asking what students need to do to get there. The introduction is the last thing to define: what prior activation prepares them for that journey? This approach is known as backward design, and it is one of the most effective ways to avoid classes that accumulate activities without a connecting thread. If you need frameworks for thinking about the objective, Bloom Cards can help you formulate learning goals with different levels of cognitive complexity.

The materials field is free text: you can write any physical or digital resource you need for that activity. Common examples: physical resources (whiteboard, markers, printed worksheets, cardstock, dice, cards); your own digital resources (Canva or Google Slides presentation, Google Forms form, YouTube video, podcast, reference image); ClasesInteractivas tools to project during that activity, such as the Collaborative Ideas Wall, Live Word Cloud, Quiz Creator or Question Dice; and external sources (article, book excerpt, documentary, map). Writing materials in the plan saves time on the day of the class because everything is listed in one place.

A class with only one type of activity throughout its entire duration tends to lose pace: a 40-minute lecture without participation tires students, and 40 minutes of group work without moments of collective synthesis disperses. A practical rule is to alternate protagonism: the teacher explains a block, students practice or discuss, the teacher takes back the floor to systematize. In the Planner this becomes visible quickly in the Development column: if all activities are of the Lecture type, consider adding at least one of the Individual, Group or Practice type. To make participation more dynamic you can use the Random Selector to choose who answers, the Group Generator to form teams in seconds, or Priority Voting for collective decision-making.

From the Planner you can incorporate differentiation directly in the materials field for each activity: for example, write 'Sheet A (advanced level) / Sheet B (foundational level)' or 'For early finishers: extension exercise'. At a structural level, Universal Design for Learning (UDL) proposes offering multiple forms of representation, action and motivation: in the Planner this translates to including activities of different types (not only reading or writing) and at least one moment where students choose how to demonstrate what they learned. The Choice Board is a particularly useful tool for that moment. For groups with very diverse needs, you can also explore Differentiated Instruction and Learning Stations, which divide development time into simultaneous circuits.

The plan is a guide, not a contract. It is normal for an activity to take longer than expected, for an unexpected question to lead to a rich discussion, or for the group to need more practice before moving on. Some tools for managing that: first, plan with a 5 to 10-minute buffer not assigned to any activity; if everything flows well, you have time to go deeper; if something runs long, that buffer absorbs the deviation without sacrificing the closure. Second, prioritize the closure: if time runs short, it is better to shorten a development activity than to cut the closure, which is where learning is consolidated. Third, record what was not covered: return to the plan after class and note which activity remains pending to pick it up in the next session. The KWL Chart and I Used to Think, Now I Think are useful for picking up the thread in the following class.

Digital tools can be in any of the three phases. In the introduction, a Live Word Cloud activates prior knowledge in minutes, or a Topic Spinner generates anticipation about what is coming. In development, the Collaborative Ideas Wall records group contributions in real time, the Timeline organizes chronologies visually, the Venn Diagram works for comparing concepts, and Silent Debate facilitates simultaneous written participation. In closure, the Quiz Creator or Comprehension Stoplight assess the group's understanding in seconds. The key is not to pile too many tools into one class: one or two well-integrated tools have more impact than five used superficially.

The time bar changes color: a red segment at the end indicates how many minutes are being exceeded, and the counter on the right shows the surplus with a plus sign. This is a signal to review the plan: either some activity has been assigned more time than it actually takes, or too many activities have been planned for the available time. The tool does not block or prevent you from continuing: the warning is only a reference for adjusting before you reach the classroom.

Yes. Hover over any activity card and two buttons appear: the pencil to edit and the trash to delete. When editing, the same form opens with all fields pre-filled: you can change the title, duration, phase, type or materials. If you change the phase (for example, moving an activity from Development to Closure), the card disappears from the original column and appears in the new one. Changes are saved automatically when you confirm.

The tool saves one plan at a time in the browser. If you want to plan a new class, first export the current one as PDF to preserve it, then use the settings button to return to the setup screen and replace the data. It is not possible to have multiple plans open simultaneously or access a history of previous classes: for that, the PDF is the recommended file format.