In my school district, and I'm sure most others, every teacher needs to have a set of "emergency lesson plans", in case they are sick or need to be out for a day, so that the substitute can have something for the students to do. They usually are not something like "Go over last night's homework, then do section 10.3" because
- These emergency plans need to be in usually within the first few weeks of school so you have no idea where you will be at with students when you are sick.
- I don't really trust the sub to legitimately instruct my students.
What I am looking for is ideas for substitute/emergency lesson plans for stand-alone, cohesive, meaningful activities that can be completed in one day (say ~1 hour long period) and that are mostly student-driven, i.e. I don't want to rely on the sub to do the heavy lifting, they should really just be a facilitator. Any suggestions?