This is a perfect example of good intentions run amok. None of these are bad ideas.

But the time demands are absurd, while much of this is simply teaching. Of course you link the content to your students lives. Of course you emphasize key vocabulary. Teaching does not need a lengthy formal plan for every hour and a whiteboard filled with sprawling objectives that sometimes intimidate students. Students who struggle to keep up with grade-level objectives may look at that whiteboard and tune out instead of tuning in. When the masterplans become too detailed, some of the kids in the mix don’t fit the plan. That’s where learning first starts to go wrong. But lost learning piles up, eventually becoming an insurmountable mountain or murky, unknown facts for less lucky students.

Eduhonesty: The more detailed the plan, the less flexible it becomes in spite of attempts at differentiation. In the end, a 50 minute period is only 50 minutes — and any items in the plan that don’t fit in those minutes then become part of the rising mound of things that never were taught.

The crucial question that begs an answer: If there are never leftover minutes — when will remediation ever happen?