One of the first questions that a new teacher always asks is, "how can I find out if my lesson plan is effective?" Finding out is, in fact, quite easy just as long as you are ready to be honest with yourself. Here are some tips you can use to evaluate the success or failure of your lesson plans.

Request someone you trust to observe you- I am sure no teacher likes the headmaster or the principal observing them teaching a class. So, if you have a mentor or a trusted colleague who can observe you during a class, request them to do so. You can gain a lot of valuable insights from them about your lesson plans. Ask them to be brutally honest with their views and opinions about what they liked or didn't like about your lesson plan. Make sure you ask them to take plenty of notes on your lesson plan as well as the student's reactions.

Request someone you trust to read your lesson plans - Asking someone to read your lesson plans is not really the best way to evaluate its effectiveness but truth be told, you can get a lot of valuable feedback when someone else reads your work. So ask a trusted co-worker to read your lesson plan and ask him/ her for their opinion.

Take notes during classes- As you teach, it is important to take notes on what part of your lesson plan was a success and what was not. Note yourself when it was a success because an anticipated question was asked by a student. Also note yourself when the lesson plan was a failure because a student did not comprehend what you were trying to teach him based on your plan and you had to change your tactic mid-way.

Check test scores and homework- Obviously, the best way to find out whether or not your lesson plan was a success is to simply observe if your students have retained whatever you have taught them. This is, of course, not the ideal metric for measuring whether your lesson plan was a success or not since students can easily memorize the lessons before a test and forget all of it later. It will, however, give you a head-start in figuring out if your lesson plan is effective in getting the lessons through to your students. At the end of the day, that is your final aim.

Capture yourself on tape while teaching- Its amazing how much we can observe when reviewing a video tape of ourselves. You can observe so many minute details that you would normally not notice while teaching. Review the tape a day or two after your lesson and evaluate what was a success and what was a failure. If possible, have one camera on yourself and one on your students so that you can observe their reactions. You could also hire a professional cameraman to record you and your class (that could be a little expensive though). By doing so, you can objectively observe and decide whether the lesson was good or not.