Use this option to create a single Lesson Plan entry. To create similar multiple Lesson Plan items at the same time, see the Adding Multiple Lesson Plan Items section.

1. On the HSTOnline menu, click or touch 'Lesson Plan' under the 'Schedules and Planning' section.
2. On the Lesson Plan page, choose a Lesson Plan to view by clicking or touching 'Lesson Plan' in the filter panel.
3. Choose a Lesson Plan to view. The Lesson Plan Name field is a Smart-Entry Field so you can:
   • press the space bar to see all the active Lesson Plans in your list
   • type a few letters into the field to see all active Lesson Plans
   • type in a new Lesson Plan Name that you want to create. The new plan name will be added to your Lesson Plan Names list as an active plan.
4. Click the Add button and choose Add - Single.

   

   • The only required fields are: Lesson Plan and Subject/Course.
   • Fields and features which have been disabled in Program Options will be hidden from view in the Add Lesson Plan Item window.

   

5. Fill in information as needed. The only required fields are Lesson Plan and Subject/Course. Add as much additional information as you like. Do not force yourself to use fields that add no value to your own homeschooling records. You can always come back and add additional information later if needed. Below, the parameters of each field will be outlined.
   
   The Lesson Plan, Subject or Subject/Course, Activity, Resource, and Location fields are all Smart-Entry Fields. To make an entry in one of these fields, you can press the space bar to see all available options, or you can begin typing to limit the options available. Smart-Entry fields allow you to create new entries for each of these fields 'on-the-fly'. Simply type in the new entry you need and HSTOnline will automatically add it to the appropriate list. See individual field notes below for more information.
   
   

   Lesson Plan: This field will be auto-filled with the name of the Lesson Plan you are currently viewing. You can change the entry if you like. If you do, when you save this Lesson Plan item it will be added to the Lesson Plan you selected here. The Lesson Plan field is a Smart-Entry Field. Press the space bar to see a list of all active Lesson Plan Names. You can begin typing the name of a Lesson Plan to see a limited list of options based on the letters entered. Click or touch the entry you want to use for this Lesson Plan item

   Subject or Subject/Course: The field name will depend on your Program Options. If the Course field is enabled you will see Subject/Course; otherwise the field name is simply Subject. The Subject and Subject/Course fields are Smart-Entry Fields. Press the space bar to see a list of all active Subjects or Subjects/Courses You can begin typing the name of a Subject or Course to see a limited list of options based on the letters entered. The list will show any entries where the Subject or the Course begin with the letters you have entered. Click or touch the entry you want to use for this Lesson Plan item. You can also choose to type in the name of a new Subject or Course. If you add a new item into the Subject field, it will be added to your list as a Core Subject. You can go to the Subjects list to edit the new entry at any time. If you add a new item to the Subject/Course field, when you Save this Lesson Plan item you will be prompted to choose whether the new entry is to be used as a Subject or as a Course. See below.

   Activity: This field is optional. Use the Activity field to provide a brief description of the type of work to be done: Lesson, Quiz, Test, Reading, etc. The Activity field is a Smart-Entry Field. Press the space bar to see a list of all active Activities You can begin typing the name of an Activity to see a limited list of options based on the letters entered Click or touch the entry you want to use for this Lesson Plan Item You can also choose to type in the name of a new Activity which will be automatically added to your list of Activities.

   Resource: This field is optional. Use the Resource field to display the name of the book, text or workbook the Student will be using to complete the work. The Resource field is a Smart-Entry Field. Press the space bar to see a list of active Resources. The Resources displayed will be limited to those which: are tied to the 'All Subjects option are tied to the selected Subject are tied to the selected Subject/Course You can begin typing the name of a Resource to see a limited list of options based on the letters entered. The available list will be further limited by the parameters noted above. Click or touch the entry you want to use for this Lesson Plan item You can also choose to type in the name of a new Resource which will be automatically added to your list of Library items as a Resource tied to the 'All Subjects' option. You can go to the Library to edit the entry at any time to add additional information.

   Location (Loc): This field is optional and is disabled by default. Use the (Assignment) Location field to note where the learning took place. This is helpful in jurisdictions where you need to keep track of the number of hours of schooling that take place in the home vs. elsewhere such as a co-op, community college, etc. In the Lesson Plan list the Location field column is labeled 'Loc'. The Location field is a Smart-Entry Field. Press the space bar to see a list of all active Locations You can begin typing the name of a Location to see a limited list of options based on the letters entered Click or touch the entry you want to use for this Lesson Plan item You can also choose to type in the name of a new Location which will be automatically added to your list of Locations with a Status of 'Away'. You can go to the Assignment Location list to edit the new entry at any time.

   Topic: This field is optional. Enter a theme for the Lesson Plan item. You can enter up to 150 characters. Your Topic might be the name of the lesson or chapter from your Resource, or some other short description of what the lesson covers. When you choose to utilize the Topic field, you can create a Scope & Sequence Report listing all the Topics covered for a selected Subject/Course and date range.

   PLC: This field is optional. PLC = Page/Lesson/Chapter. Use this field to note the exact pages, lesson or chapter associated with the work to be done, up to 150 characters.

   Custom: This field is optional and is disabled by default. This text field allows you to enter any additional information about the Lesson Plan item, up to 150 characters.

   Day: Enter a Day number for the Lesson Plan item. The Day number is the field that determines the sequence of your items within the Lesson Plan. Work that is to be assigned on the same date should have the same Day number in your Lesson Plan. You can use the Change Day Numbers action to reorder your Lesson Plan items at any time.

   Order: This field is optional and is disabled by default. If you have more than one Lesson Plan item with the same Day number, you can use the Order field to indicate which items should come first, second, etc., in that slot.

   Possible: If desired, you can pre-enter the number of Points Possible for the Assignments that will be created from this Lesson Plan item. If you have disabled Grading, these fields will not appear. If you are entering this Lesson Plan item after the work has been completed, enter the Points Earned in the 2nd box. Grades are automatically calculated when the Points Possible value is greater than zero and the Complete - Teacher box is checked. Please see the Grading Help Page for detailed information about how grades are entered and calculated in HSTOnline.

   Time Spent/Sessions: This field is optional. This field will be labeled Time Spent or Sessions, depending on your selection in the Program Options: Optional Fields. For Time Spent, you can enter any value up to 999:59 (999 hours, 59 minutes). For Sessions, you can enter any number from 0.00 to 999.99.

   Reschedule: A checkmark in this box allows Assignments created from this Lesson Plan item to be moved forward or backward in time when using the Reschedule feature. The box is checked by default. The column name for this field is Resch.

   Links: This field is optional and is disabled by default. Click or touch the field name or pencil icon to open the Links window Click or touch 'Add new record' to enter a URL and caption. Click or touch Save to add the Link to the list. In the Lesson Plan item add/edit window, the added links will be displayed; in the Lesson Plan list Links column, the number of Links that have been added to the Lesson Plan item will be displayed. See Adding Links for more information.

   Supplies: This field is optional and is disabled by default. Click or touch the field name or pencil icon to open the Supplies window Click or touch 'Add new record' to enter a supply name and quantity. Click or touch Save to add the Supply to the list. In the Lesson Plan item add/edit window, the added supplies will be displayed; in the Lesson Plan list Supplies column, the number of distinct Supplies that have been added to the Lesson Plan item will be displayed. See Adding Supplies for more information.

   Skills: This field is optional and is disabled by default. Click or touch the field name or pencil icon to open the Supplies window Click or touch a skill to select it; click or touch 'Add Selected Skills' to add them to the Current Skills area; click or touch Save to add them to the Lesson Plan item. In the Lesson Plan item add/edit window, the added supplies will be displayed; in the Lesson Plan list Skills column, the number of Skills that have been attached to the Lesson Plan item will be displayed. See Attaching Skills for more information.

   Directions: This field is optional. Click or touch the field name or pencil icon to open the Directions window Enter Directions for the Student. Click the Save button to add the Directions to the Lesson Plan item. There are two columns for Directions in the Lesson Plan list: Dir (*) - this column is enabled by default and displays an asterisk (*) when Directions have been entered for the Lesson Plan item Directions (Preview) - this column is hidden by default and displays the first 150 characters of any Directions which have been entered for the Lesson Plan item See Directions and Notes for more information regarding the formatting controls.

   Notes: This field is optional and is disabled by default. Click or touch the field name or pencil icon to open the Notes window Enter Notes for yourself. Notes will not appear when logged in under a Student User Account. Click the Save button to add the Notes to the Lesson Plan item. There are two columns for Notes in the Lesson Plan list: Notes (*) - this column is hidden by default and displays an asterisk (*) when Notes have been entered for the Lesson Plan item Notes (Preview) - this column is hidden by default and displays the first 150 characters of any Notes which have been entered for the Lesson Plan item See Directions and Notes for more information regarding the formatting controls.

6. Click or touch:
   • Cancel to abandon the new item without adding to your Lesson Plan.
   • Save to add this item to your Lesson Plan.
   • The 'Add Another' hyperlink in the top right corner to save this Lesson Plan item and add another. You can click 'Add Another' each time until you have entered the last new Lesson Plan item needed and then click the Save button to end the Add process.
7. If you have entered a new Subject or Course in the Subject/Course field, HSTOnline will ask for clarification when you click or touch the Save button or the 'Add Another' link.

   

   • Choose whether to create your new entry as a new Subject or a new Course.
     • Add as new Subject: the new entry will be added to your Subjects list with a status of 'Core'. You can edit the item in your Subjects list to change the status as needed.
     • Add as new Course with a Subject of: Select a Subject from the drop down list. The Course will be attached to that Subject and created with the following settings:
       • Credit Hours - 0.00
       • Calculation Option - Basic
       • Grading Scale - Default Grading Scale
       • Weighting - Off
       You can edit the item in your Courses list to change the parameters as needed.
     • Click or touch:
       • Cancel to be returned to the Add Lesson Plan item window to make a new selection in the Subject/Course field.
       • Save to keep the new Subject or Course and add the item to your Lesson Plan.

The steps below show how to create multiple items for a Lesson Plan that share the same Subject/Course designation and can also share other features such as Activity, Resource, Location, Points Possible, etc. This action can help you quickly create the 'bones' of a Lesson Plan. You can always go back and edit or multi-edit the created items to make adjustments to the individual items or groups of items at a time.

See the Creating a Lesson Plan with Repeating Pattern Help Page for specific instructions on generating a plan which has a repetitive pattern of activity types, such as a math curriculum with X number of lessons, followed by a test, followed by more lessons, followed by a test, etc.

1. On the HSTOnline menu, click or touch 'Lesson Plan' under the 'Schedules and Planning' section.
2. On the Lesson Plan page, choose a Lesson Plan to view by clicking or touching 'Lesson Plan' in the filter panel.
3. Choose a Lesson Plan to view. The Lesson Plan Name field is a Smart-Entry Field so you can:
   • press the space bar to see all the active Lesson Plans in your list
   • type a few letters into the field to see all active Lesson Plans
   • type in a new Lesson Plan Name that you want to create. The new plan name will be added to your Lesson Plan Names list as an active plan.
4. Click the Add button and choose Add - Multiple.

   

   • The 'Add Lesson Plan Items' form is a tabbed area: Details, Day Numbers, and Page/Lesson/Chapter. The active tab area will have a thick, blue underline. Click on any tab name to move to that area. You can move back and forth as many times as you need as you adjust your option settings.
   • The only required fields are: Lesson Plan and Subject/Course in the Details tab.
5. Item Details:

   Details: Fill in information as needed. Fields and features which have been disabled in Program Options will be hidden from view in the Assignment Details area. The only required fields in this area are the Lesson Plan and Subject or Subject/Course field. The Lesson Plan field will show the name of the Lesson Plan you are currently viewing. For information on completing these fields, see above. When creating multiple Lesson Plan items, the Page/Lesson/Chapter field is completed in the last tab area so that field does not appear here.

6. Click or touch:
   • Return to Lesson Plan to cancel this process and return to the Lesson Plan list.
   • Continue to Day Numbers or the Day Numbers tab to move to the next set of options.

   

7. Day Numbers:

   Start On: Enter the first Day number you want to use for this series of Lesson Plan items. The default entry is 1. Increment By: Enter the increment you want between Day numbers for these items. The default entry is 1 Example 1: If your Start On is 1 and your Increment By is 1, and you create 5 items, their Day Numbers will be 1, 2, 3, 4, 5 Example 2: If your Start On is 1 and your Increment By is 5, and you create 5 items, their Day Numbers will be 1, 6, 11, 16, 21 Skip over Day Numbers that are already in use: If there are existing items in the Lesson Plan you are working with, you can check this box to have HSTOnline skip over any Day Numbers that are already being used for other items in the Lesson Plan. This will prevent you from doubling up with two or more items on the same Day number. Example 1: The Lesson Plan already has items on 1, 6, 11, 16, 21, 26 and you create 6 more items, starting on 1, inc by 5 and skip over existing day numbers, the new items will have Day numbers of: 31, 36, 41, 46, 51 and 56. Because HSTOnline will start looking for available numbers on Day 1, then add 5 and continue doing so until it finds the first open number that is 5 greater than the previous attempt. Example 2: The Lesson Plan already has items on 1, 6, 11, 16, 21, 26 and you create 6 more items, starting on 2, inc by 2 and skip over existing day numbers, the new items will be Day numbers of: 2, 4, 8, 10, 12, 14. Day 6 will be skipped because it is already in use. The Preview screen will show you the new items you are creating along with the existing items in the Lesson Plan so you can evaluate whether you set the Day number start and increment the way you need them for the overall Lesson Plan.

8. Click or touch:
   • Return to Agenda to cancel this process and return to the Lesson Plan list.
   • Continue to PLC or the Page/Lesson/Chapter tab to move to the next set of options.

   

9. Page/Lesson/Chapter: There are four options for creating Page/Lesson/Chapter text for multiple Lesson Plan items: the first, is to have the same text appear in the PLC field for each Assignment created; the other three options allow you to create an auto-increment pattern for the PLC information. See the PLC Copy Options Help Page for step-by-step instructions on completing this section. Below is a brief description of each option:

   If you have disabled the Page/Lesson/Chapter field, the only option here will be to set the number of copies that you want to create. Enter the number of copies you want and click or touch 'Continue to Preview'.

   Same Page/Lesson/Chapter: When the PLC field is enabled this is the default selection. When you choose this option, the same text - or no text - will appear in the Page/Lesson/Chapter field of each Lesson Plan item. Enter text in the Page/Lesson/Chapter field, or leave it blank Enter the number of copies you want to create.

   1-Part Auto-Increment: Set a pattern for HSTOnline to follow where the Page/Lesson/Chapter text is incremented for each item created. In a 1-Part increment you can create entries such as: Lesson 1, Lesson 2, Lesson 3, etc. Pages 1-4, Pages 5-8,, Pages 9-12, etc.

   2-Part Auto-Increment: Set a pattern for HSTOnline to follow where the Page/Lesson/Chapter text is incremented for each item created. In a 2-Part increment you can create entries such as: Lesson 1.1, Lesson 1.2, Lesson 1.3, etc. Chapter 16 - Part A, Chapter 16 - Part B, Chapter 17 - Part A, etc.

   3-Part Auto-Increment: Set a pattern for HSTOnline to follow where the Page/Lesson/Chapter text is incremented for each item created. In a 3-Part increment you can create entries such as: Chapter 1: Lesson 1: Part A, Chapter 1: Lesson 1: Part B, Chapter 1: Lesson 2: Part A, etc.

10. Click or touch:
    • Return to Lesson Plan to cancel this process and return to the Lesson Plan list.
    • Continue to Preview to see the list of Lesson Plan items that will be created based on the options you have set.
11. If you have entered a new Subject or Course in the Subject/Course field, HSTOnline will ask for clarification when you click or touch the Save button or the 'Add Another' link.

    

    • Choose whether to create your new entry as a new Subject or a new Course.
      • Add as new Subject: the new entry will be added to your Subjects list with a status of 'Core'. You can edit the item in your Subjects list to change the status as needed.
      • Add as new Course with a Subject of: Select a Subject from the drop down list. The Course will be attached to that Subject and created with the following settings:
        • Credit Hours - 0.00
        • Calculation Option - Basic
        • Grading Scale - Default Grading Scale
        • Weighting - Off
        You can edit the item in your Courses list to change the parameters as needed.
      • Click or touch:
        • Cancel to be returned to the Add Lesson Plan item window to make a new selection in the Subject/Course field.
        • Save to keep the new Subject or Course and add the item to your Lesson Plan.
12. If you choose 'Continue to Preview', HSTOnline will show you the Lesson Plan that will be created based upon your option settings, along with any existing items that are already in the Lesson Plan. Existing items in the Lesson Plan will appear in the Preview with a lavender background. Take this opportunity to review the items before accepting them to be added to your database.
    • The Preview will show you all items, sorted by Day Number. You can group or sort the Preview list in any way you like and HSTOnline will remember those settings each time you return to the Preview list.
    • If the results are not what you expected, you can click or touch the Details, Day Numbers, or Page/Lesson/Chapter tab to reset your options and then click or touch the 'Return to Preview' button to see the new results.

    

13. Once you are satisfied with the items displayed in the Preview, you can select the items you want to add to your Agenda. Click or touch the 'Select All' badge to select all the new Lesson Plan items in the list. Alternatively,
    • you can click or touch the checkbox for each Lesson Plan item you want to accept.
    • you can use your mouse to click and drag over contiguous entries in the list to select those items.
    • on a touch device, you can touch and drag your finger over contiguous entries in the list to select those items.

    

14. Click or touch:
    • Return to Agenda to abandon this process and return to the Lesson Plan list.
    • Accept Selected Items to add the highlighted items to your Lesson Plan.