Affordance-based lesson planning in pre-service teacher education.

This article explores the feasibility and usefulness of affordance-based lesson planning (ABLP) in pre-service teacher education, comparing it with traditional outcomes-based lesson planning (OBLP) among English language trainee teachers in North Macedonia. Affordance-based planning emphasizes flexibility and responsiveness to learning opportunities during lessons, replacing fixed outcomes with "predicted learning opportunities" and including sections for possible occurrences and responses. The study found that while both ABLP and OBLP were valued for different reasons, some pre-service teachers found ABLP more cognitively demanding and time-consuming, expressing a desire for greater agency in choosing or designing lesson plan pro formas (LPPFs). The authors suggest gradual introduction of ABLP, collaborative planning, and dialogic approaches to support teacher agency and reflection, concluding that affordance-based planning holds promise but requires careful facilitation in teacher education contexts.