Good planning is essential, and is even more effective when it is a collaborative process.
A scheme of work improves consistency across the department and helps to ensure a coherent experience for pupils. Its prime purposes are to:
The time involved is an investment for future years. In addition, the collaboration can reduce the demands of paperwork in the long term. Plans stored in electronic format can be accessible to all staff and are easily adjusted when required. Once the process is established, planning becomes easier.
Plans can be well constructed and informative without being written in full prose, although they need to be accessible to others.
It is helpful to consider the elements that form a scheme of work and how you might choose to move between the overview of the curriculum and the detail of a particular unit or lesson.