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Balancing Your Expectation

Faculty: Arts. Degree programme: Information Studies. Course: Student teacher sessions in Business and Technology. Study level: Semester 2, BA. Size of class: 30-60. 

Motivation for the activity

The success of any course depends to a large extent on ensuring that the parties involved have the same expectations regarding the content and format of the teaching. This activity describes how to balance your expectations with those of the students. 

Description of the activity

This activity describes how to balance your expectations with those of the students both at the start of the course and during the semester.

Student teachers also have to collaborate with teachers and (in some cases) other student teachers. The PDF files in the box on the right can be used to balance the expectations of everyone involved. 

Balancing expectations at the start of the semester

Have a five-minute session in which the students discuss the following questions:

  • What do you expect to get out of the student teacher sessions?
  • What do you expect of your student teacher?
  • What do you expect to contribute yourself?

    Then discuss all the ideas and listen to the students’ expectations. Ask a student to take minutes. Then present your own expectations, give feedback on their input, and be honest about the expectations that you don’t agree with or can’t live up to. Be clear about what you expect of the students and about your role as a student teacher.

    Interim evaluation

    Halfway through the semester you should discuss the minutes of the first session with the students.

    Then ask the students to answer the following questions on two post-it notes:

    • In which areas do you think that the student teacher, the teaching or you as a student have lived up to expectations?
    • Which areas have room for improvement?

      Collect the notes and read them. Prepare a summary to present to the class in the next teaching session. Then have a short discussion in which you can ask for clarification of unclear answers and discuss how to jointly improve the teaching. 

      The balancing of expectations gives you insight into how the students perceive the teaching. You get a chance to improve your teaching, and the students feel that they are being taken seriously, which will probably increase their motivation and participation in your classes.

      Activities

        Examples of Practice


          Useful documents

          You can find some useful inspiration for questions to ask different parties here:

          Contributer

          Julie Bondgård, student and instructor at Information Studies.