Teach17

Lesson planning can become unnecessarily complicated. Teachers may spend hours producing detailed slides, worksheets and written plans, yet still reach the end of a lesson unsure about what pupils have actually learned.

The CHACER framework offers a simpler approach:

Consolidate – Hook – Acquire – Check – Extend – Reflect

It is not a rigid formula or a requirement to divide every lesson into six equal sections. Instead, it provides six useful questions that can guide planning:

What do pupils need to remember?
Why should they care about the new learning?
How will the new knowledge be taught?
How will understanding be checked?
How will pupils deepen their thinking?
How will they reflect on what they have learned?

Here are 17 practical ways to use CHACER effectively.

1. Use CHACER to reduce planning rather than add to it

A planning framework is only useful when it makes teaching easier.

CHACER should help teachers make decisions quickly. It should not become another form to complete, another set of boxes to tick or another lesson structure that must be followed during an observation.

A brief plan might simply include one line for each stage:

• Consolidate: three retrieval questions.
• Hook: surprising photograph.
• Acquire: teacher explanation and worked example.
• Check: mini-whiteboard question.
• Extend: unfamiliar application.
• Reflect: one exit question.

That may be all the written planning an experienced teacher needs.

2. Treat the stages as questions, not compulsory activities

Each stage should prompt a planning question.

For example:

• What prior knowledge will pupils need?
• What might make them curious?
• How will I explain the new idea?
• How will I know whether they understand?
• How will I increase the level of challenge?
• How will pupils recognise what they have learned?

This keeps the focus on learning rather than on producing activities.

3. Start by consolidating the knowledge pupils will actually need

The first stage is Consolidate.

A useful consolidation task should prepare pupils for the lesson ahead. It should not simply revisit random content because it was taught last week.

Before teaching electrical power, pupils might retrieve:

• the meaning of current;
• the meaning of potential difference;
• the equation for energy transferred;
• the units used for power and energy.

The starter then becomes the first part of the lesson rather than an unrelated warm-up.

4. Keep consolidation short and focused

A consolidation task does not need to occupy the first fifteen minutes.

Three well-chosen questions may be more useful than a long quiz covering an entire topic. The teacher can quickly identify whether pupils possess the knowledge needed for the new lesson.

Possible formats include:

• a diagram completed from memory;
• one calculation;
• a definition;
• a mistake to correct;
• a previous exam question;
• a short explanation to a partner.

The aim is to reactivate useful knowledge, not to fill time.

5. Use retrieval to reveal gaps, not just produce scores

A retrieval task should tell the teacher something.

When pupils struggle with a question, that information should influence the lesson. The teacher may need to revisit a definition, model a calculation again or address a misconception before moving on.

Retrieval is not simply about pupils remembering more. It also helps the teacher decide whether the class is ready for the next stage.

6. Use the hook to create a reason to learn

The H stands for Hook.

A strong hook creates curiosity, surprise or a problem that pupils want to solve.

For example:

• Why can a bird sit on a high-voltage cable?
• How can a steel ship float?
• Why does a bicycle pump become warm?
• Why do passengers move forward when a car stops suddenly?
• Why can a small drawing pin produce a large pressure?

The hook introduces a gap between what pupils currently know and what they want to understand.

7. Avoid hooks that become empty entertainment

A dramatic demonstration may gain attention, but attention alone does not guarantee learning.

Pupils may remember the explosion, video clip or unusual object while forgetting the scientific idea it was supposed to introduce.

A useful hook should connect directly to the lesson. The teacher should return to it later and ask pupils to explain it using their new knowledge.

The hook is therefore not an isolated performance. It becomes a question that the lesson eventually answers.

8. Make the main learning question clear

Pupils should know what intellectual problem they are trying to solve.

A concise question is often more useful than a long learning objective.

For example:

• How does a transformer change potential difference?
• Why does resistance increase in a filament lamp?
• How do we calculate the acceleration of an object?
• Why did the population of British cities grow during the Industrial Revolution?
• How does a writer create tension?

A strong question gives the lesson direction and creates something meaningful to revisit at the end.

9. Use Acquire for carefully taught new knowledge

The A stands for Acquire.

This is the point at which pupils encounter and begin to understand something new.

They might acquire knowledge through:

• teacher explanation;
• modelling;
• reading;
• practical work;
• guided discussion;
• examples and non-examples;
• diagrams;
• demonstrations;
• worked problems.

The important issue is not how exciting the activity appears. It is whether the activity helps pupils understand the intended content.

10. Break difficult learning into manageable steps

Complex tasks often feel easy to experts because many individual steps have become automatic.

Pupils may need those steps made visible.

For a physics calculation, the teacher might model how to:

1. identify the quantity being calculated;
2. select the correct equation;
3. check the units;
4. substitute the values;
5. complete the calculation;
6. give the final unit;
7. judge whether the answer is reasonable.

Breaking the process down reduces unnecessary confusion while allowing pupils to concentrate on the new learning.

11. Explain the thinking behind successful answers

Pupils often see a finished answer without seeing the decisions that produced it.

Teacher modelling should make those decisions explicit.

For example:

“I need to calculate the force, so I am looking for an equation containing force. The question gives mass and acceleration, which suggests that I should use force equals mass multiplied by acceleration. Before calculating, I am checking that the mass is in kilograms.”

This allows pupils to see how an expert selects information, chooses a method and checks an answer.

12. Check understanding before pupils practise independently

The second C stands for Check.

Teachers should not wait until books are marked or a test is completed before discovering that pupils have misunderstood the lesson.

A check can take less than a minute:

• a mini-whiteboard answer;
• a multiple-choice question;
• a cold-called explanation;
• one calculation;
• a sentence completed from memory;
• a diagram labelled;
• an error identified in a worked example.

The check should take place before pupils begin a long period of independent practice.

13. Ask questions that reveal misconceptions

Some questions only show whether pupils can remember a fact. Better questions reveal how pupils are thinking.

For example:

Two identical bulbs are connected in series. What happens to the current when a third identical bulb is added?

A. It increases.
B. It decreases.
C. It remains the same.
D. It becomes zero.

Each incorrect option can represent a different misunderstanding. The pupils’ answers therefore give the teacher useful information about what needs to happen next.

14. Be prepared to change the lesson

A check is pointless when the teacher ignores the result.

When many pupils are confused, the teacher may need to:

• explain the idea in a different way;
• show another example;
• return to an earlier step;
• use a diagram;
• reduce the difficulty temporarily;
• pair pupils for guided practice;
• address a misconception directly.

Good planning should create a direction for the lesson while leaving enough flexibility to respond to the class.

15. Use Extend to deepen rather than lengthen the work

Extension should not mean completing twenty more questions of the same type.

The E stands for Extend because pupils should extend their understanding.

They might:

• apply the idea to an unfamiliar situation;
• compare two possible methods;
• explain why an answer is wrong;
• justify a conclusion;
• create their own example;
• connect the learning to a previous topic;
• solve a problem containing irrelevant information;
• predict what would happen if one variable changed.

The aim is greater depth, not simply a greater quantity of work.

16. Make extension available to everyone

Extension should not be reserved for a small group of pupils who finish quickly.

All pupils should encounter worthwhile thinking. Some may require scaffolding to reach it.

Support might include:

• a vocabulary list;
• a diagram;
• sentence starters;
• the first line of a calculation;
• a partially completed example;
• a choice between two possible methods;
• a reminder of relevant prior knowledge.

Scaffolding should help pupils access the difficult thinking rather than remove the difficulty completely.

17. Finish by helping pupils recognise what has changed

The R stands for Reflect.

Reflection should help pupils identify what they now know, understand or can do that they could not do at the beginning of the lesson.

Useful reflection tasks include:

• answering the original lesson question;
• explaining the hook;
• correcting an earlier answer;
• completing one exit question;
• writing the most important idea from the lesson;
• identifying one remaining uncertainty;
• explaining the lesson to someone who was absent;
• comparing confidence at the beginning and end.

Avoid vague questions such as “What did you learn today?” More focused prompts produce more useful responses:

• Why does a steel ship float?
• What is the difference between mass and weight?
• Which step in the calculation is most important?
• What mistake are you now less likely to make?
• What would you need to practise again?

CHACER should remain flexible

Not every lesson needs six clearly separated stages.

A practical activity may provide the hook, acquisition and checking at the same time. A difficult concept may require several cycles of explanation and checking. Reflection may happen at the start of the following lesson rather than during the final two minutes.

The stages may also occur in a different order. A lesson could begin with a challenging problem, identify gaps in pupils’ knowledge and then return to the same problem after teaching the necessary content.

The strength of CHACER is not that it creates identical lessons. Its strength is that it encourages teachers to plan around six essential aspects of learning:

remembering, curiosity, explanation, assessment, challenge and reflection.

Used sensibly, it can make planning clearer, reduce unnecessary workload and help teachers remain focused on the most important question of all:

What will pupils know, understand or be able to do by the end of this lesson that they could not do at the beginning?