The Power of Clear Expectations: How to Clarify and Communicate Them

Do You Have Clear Expectations?

One area of classroom management that we just don't talk about enough is clarifying our expectations. You might be surprised how big of a difference this can make. If I ask you, “How you want students to behave in your classroom?”, you could probably list off a few things immediately. But if I were to start asking some more nitty gritty questions, or if you had to actually write down exactly what you expect in a variety of different scenarios in your classroom, you might quickly come to realize that your expectations might not actually be as clear as you think.

For example, when I was first teaching, the kids put their heads down on their desk and I remember thinking to myself, "Is that okay? Do I want to allow that or should I have them sit up?" And I asked myself this question in the middle of a lesson when I did not really have the space or capacity to really think about it. Why? Because I actually hadn't clarified that expectation. If you start thinking about it, you might think of other things that students have done in your class that you realize you have not clarified.

If the expectation is not clear in your mind, then it hasn't been communicated clearly to the students.

What happens when our expectations aren't clear? When it happens in class, we don't know whether we should address it or not, I probably end up just letting it go because I am not really sure about it. This may also result in being  inconsistent, and letting it go one day, then coming down on it the next day. If you haven't decided in your own mind, then it makes you unsure and students pick up on that uncertainty. It also is very stressful to be distracted in the middle of our lesson by the inner question that we're trying to answer.

Keeping Expectations Clear For Students

Another problem when our expectations aren't clear is that it's also not clear to the students. If we don't know where the line is, then have not drawn a clear line for our students. If we're inconsistent, then they never know where the line is. So it is very, very important for us to clarify our expectations.

When we work with teachers in Classroom Management 101, our online course where we help teachers reduce disruptions by making a classroom management plan, one of the first things we do is we clarify expectations. We go through all kinds of different areas and think about where we are going to draw the line so that when something happens in the classroom, we’re  not debating internally. Instead, we know what to do—either that it is ok to let it go or that we will deal with the behavior. 

Make Your Expectations Clear to You

So how do we actually clarify expectations? Well, we start with making your expectations clear to you.

Write down all of the common scenarios that happen in your classroom. And then you want to think through, what am I going to do? What is allowed and what isn't? We recommend you write these down on paper or in a document. If you write your expectations down, you will have so much more clarity. You'll be able to refer back them, but even more importantly, having to write them down forces you to make them precise. 

If you work with us in Classroom Management 101, we have a template to help write out your expectations. Some of the questions on there are designed to help you think through variations of scenarios, for instance: When are students allowed to talk and what talking levels are acceptable at different times? Because the rule isn't really no talking ever. So when is that allowed? What does respect look like? What does disrespect look like? When is a student allowed to stand up and wander around the room and when are they not? These questions help you recognize the difference.

Tips For Clarifying Expectations To Yourself

This is where you pick your battles, and you must pick them wisely. In general, it's good advice to pick your battles. But it can be misapplied in classroom management. If “pick your battles,” enables a teacher to let all kinds of things go in their classroom, that’s not picking battles wisely. 

What is happening is that students are crossing the line, and end up pushing it further and further away from what you expected from them. Instead of picking battles in the moment, we want to pick our battles ahead of time. There are certain things that I might say, "I'm gonna allow that. I'm not going to fight that battle. We can allow that here." But there are other battles you might need to decide you are going to fight.

Consider what you think is appropriate. You need to feel aligned with where you draw your lines. In other words, that you believe this is the right line. It might be different than the teacher in the next room; some teachers might draw the line more strictly than you, some less. You need to feel confident in your line, because if you are confident, you will be able to hold it much better. If you don't feel confident, if you feel like your line is too strict or too lenient, you'll spend time and energy second guessing it all the time. You can always adjust it later if you want to.

Another tip is not to drop expectations in hopes that students will meet them. When I was teaching, I wanted students to use a green pen to grade in class. Sometimes we would have them grade something that we did real quick in class. Then I would take it and look at it for an actual grade. I wanted them to grade in green because we did the math in pencil. That way it was different from the red I used for my grades. Students knew they needed a green pen, but often would forget it. I would tell them to use another pen. I ended up fighting that battle all year.

Students continually came without the green pen. The next year I decided I was going to stop fighting the green pen battle. I said any pen is fine as long as it is different than pencil. I thought I was good to go, but what I discovered was that it didn't work. The students that used to not have a green pen, but at least had a pen, now they came to class with no pen at all. So in other words, the problem wasn't that I was expecting something unreasonable by asking them to have a green pen. 

I had lowered the expectation hoping to avoid the battle. But what actually ended up happening was that I had the exact same battle and now it was worse. So my advice here is, in light of that story, don't drop expectations in hopes that students will be able to meet them because they're lower. Set the bar where you think it should be and recognize there will always be students who come in under the bar.

3 Tips for Communicating Clear Expectations

1. Discuss expectations as they come up: Just putting something in a syllabus, students may or may not read that, much less remember it, right? So what does this look like in actually communicating with them on a regular basis? First of all, discuss expectations as they come up. Don't just go over a list of expectations at the beginning of the year or all at once. Instead, you want to clarify expectations as things comes up. Reiterate when you are doing small groups: “This is what is expected during small groups.” Be ready to continue to remind them of your expectations until it is clear to them. Discuss them as they come up, not in one huge long list. 
2. Hold the line:  The way you are going to make the line or expectation clear is by holding that line. What does that look like? When students step over it, you say something, you do something. That is going to be the most important thing. So you do want to be ready and think through, what you will do when the student crosses the line. Then, be ready to do that and stay consistent. That's really, really important. Because if you say, "This is the line", but then you let students cross it, without any response from you, they’ll keep crossing it. 
3. Start small: It can be helpful to focus on one or two areas at a time, especially if it's the middle of the year. They're not going to be able to keep up with a giant list. But if you focus on this one area or two areas, that will be more manageable; you’ll be able to focus on them and be really consistent every time someone crosses over the line. Then you work on each one of those for a couple of weeks, however long it takes, until you get the hang of this one. Then, do the next one and the next one. So pick them off one by one, rather than trying to do them all at once.

More Resources

I hope these tips have been helpful for you as you think about clarifying your expectations. One final word of advice is to recognize that clarifying these expectations is just one part of the plan. There are a lot of other pieces that need to work together. You can find out more about those in our free training, How to Reduce Disruptions so You Can Actually Teach. Or if you just want to jump right to the all-in-one solution- Classroom Management 101.