One day this past school year, I accidentally deleted the wrong folder on my work computer. The folder containing ALL of my classroom lesson plans {eek!}. Normally, that wouldn’t be an issue because I would just retrieve it from the recycling bin; however, apparently the computer I was using at work had a default setting where everything that is deleted is gone. Just gone. As in forever. No recycling bin…no recovering lost files…nothing. I went through the 5 stages of grief pretty quickly. At first I couldn’t believe that I had deleted every single one of my classroom lessons, then I was incredibly angry I couldn’t recover the files. I bargained with God to help me find a way to get them back, and I literally sat at my desk for 15 minutes feeling depressed and hopeless. So, what got me to acceptance? The memory that I had backups! I remembered that I had many of those lessons on a flash drive {but unfortunately I hadn’t backed that up in a while}, and all of them were included in my lesson plan book!

Even though it meant re-typing many of my lesson plans, this book saved me that day. It includes every lesson plan and handout I use by grade level, and I also put my small group curriculums in the back.

The lesson plan format I use is pretty simple, including goals, objectives, materials, procedure, and ASCA standards met. You can get my lesson plan layout for FREE in my TPT store.

FRONT

BACK

Once I’ve compiled my lessons, handouts, section dividers, and small group curriculums, I take the entire pile to Office Depot, and they bind it together for about $4.

Not only is this method of organizing my lesson plans a space saver and money saver {binders big enough to hold all of that are bulky and can be expensive!}, but it certainly helped my sanity on the dreadful day I accidentally deleted my lessons. Here are the morals of the story, friends: (1) Always have a back up, (2) Keep hard copies in addition to electronic copies of your lessons {just in case}, (3) Find a system that works for you {for me, binding everything into a book works best}, (4) If you need help writing out your lesson plans, head over to my TPT store for your FREEBIE!