Bruce Wilkinson, 7 Laws of the Learner: Law 2 expectation

The Law of
Expectation
Pages 77-108

Tuesday 19 October 2010

The essence of the
Law of Expectation is
three words:
The Law of
“Expect the best.”
Expectation The teacher should
inﬂuence his students
learning and
behaviour by
adjusting expectations


What is your usual expectation
of ‘your’ students?
Do you have high expectations
of the people around you, your
family, your friends...?
Most people don’t!
Often we think such thoughts
are private and make no
difference anyway - don’t let
your true feelings show and it
will all be ﬁne.


The Law of Expectation
rejects this idea and
says what you think has
a powerful and
undeniable impact on
everyone you meet,
inside and out of the
classroom.


Is it Biblically similar to honour?
If you honour someone more you ﬁnd
their performance ‘improves’ and your
satisfaction with them increases too.


Hebrews 10:24-25 And let us consider how we may spur
one another on toward love and good deeds. Let us not
give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of
doing, but let us encourage one another—and all the more
as you see the Day approaching.

Hebrews 3:12-13 See to it, brothers, that none of you has
a sinful, unbelieving heart that turns away from the
living God. But encourage one another daily, as long as it
is called Today, so that none of you may be hardened by
sin's deceitfulness.


Consider - to scrutinise, to evaluate, to
constantly look at our audience and say, “Where
are they? Are they with me right now or not?
What are their needs? How can I adjust my
content and delivery to teach them more
effectively?”
It also means, “to brood over”, to quietly analyse
the messages you are sending me, your body
language.
It is easy as teachers to forget to consider the
students and get caught up in the content of
teaching.

Heb 10:25 - consider, (done by
me for you without you
necessarily knowing), is
followed by the idea of spurring
one another on - this link is made
by exhorting or encouraging you.
Exhort/encourage is not
criticism but mutual concern
coming alongside to love, care
and help.
Have you exhorted anyone
today?

Exhort to love and good
works is really positive -
but also Heb 3:12-13 brings
an idea of caring enough to
help bring you back on
track if things aren’t as they
should be - a frank
conversation or rebuke
might be needed to exhort
someone.


Neh. 13:25 I rebuked them
and called curses down on
them. I beat some of the men
and pulled out their hair. I
made them take an oath in
God's name and said: "You are
not to give your daughters in
marriage to their sons, nor are
you to take their daughters in
marriage for your sons or for
yourselves.


Do you love someone
enough to rebuke them, are
you concerned enough to
speak openly to them?
They might not like you for it!
As a teacher you are asking’
“how can I help you grow,
is there sin you need help
with, what do you need?”


The Expectation Model

Wilkinson represents the model in the following
diagram;


The speaker examines or
Speaker considers the student in
order to shape them - such
“Examine” consideration takes place
Shape constantly and in private
(the teachers mind / heart)
Private
Constantly


+ve
Love, good
The student should be Student works

‘excited’ by the teacher,
resulting in +ve or -ve “Excite”
action. This is personal Stir Up
and progressive for
Personal
each student Progressive
-ve
No hard
heart


The arrow represents the process of
exhortation/speaking on a daily basis in a
public manner

Subject

“Exhort Speak”

Public Daily


+ve
Love, good
Speaker Student works
Subject
“Examine” “Excite”
“Exhort Speak”
Shape Stir Up

Private Personal
Public Daily Progressive
Constantly
-ve
No hard
heart


A powerful force - for good
or ill - lies within our
expectations


Maxim 1: Expectations exist in everyone
about everything all the time

We all have expectations already -
about everything!
If you expected great and got good -
you are disappointed.
If you expect good and it turns out to
be great - you are excited.
If reality matches or exceeds
expectations you are (usually) happy.

The problem is reality. We live on earth with sinful
people, heaven will be perfect, earth will not be.
Acknowledging this and working through the
reality of your expectations helps you to adjust
where necessary.
What did you expect of this class?
What do you expect of marriage?
Without adjustment expectations what results?


Disappointment


Disappointment
Discouragement - deeper than
disappointed


Disappointment
disappointed
Disillusionment - no longer having
a false sense of reality, seeing a reality
you don’t like


Disappointment
disappointed
you don’t like
Despair - a lack of hope, reality will
never meet expectations


Disappointment
disappointed
you don’t like
Despair - a lack of hope, reality will
never meet expectations
Understanding this should help us
in, and out, of the classroom


Maxim 2: Expectations impact us and
others
Until 1890 90% of all pills
prescribed by doctors were
placebos. The worse the disease
the bigger and uglier the pills.
Wilkinson tells of a doctor
giving a placebo to a patient
who said they were allergic to
the real medicine - an allergic
reaction followed.


A new type of machine was
introduced by the US Census
Bureau. Employees were told they
could type 550 entries per day using
it. After 2 weeks of emotional
distress it was concluded this was
not possible.
To deal with the backlog new staff
were employed, in a different ofﬁce,
with the new machines. They
averaged 2100 cards per day - with
no side effects.


A new type of machine was

The power
introduced by the US Census
Bureau. Employees were told they

of
could type 550 entries per day using
it. After 2 weeks of emotional

expectations
distress it was concluded this was
not possible.

were employed, very ofﬁce,
is in a different
To deal with the backlog new staff

great!
with the new machines. They
averaged 2100 cards per day - with
no side effects.


Maxim 3: Expectations are rooted in the past,
influence the present, and impact the future

Expectations are usually
built on information - or
misinformation - from
the past. Once built they
inﬂuence our attitudes
and actions in the
present and impact
ourselves and others in
the future.

Imagine hearing these nicknames before you met the
person - what do they make you think expect?


Ashun the awful, Robin the rascal, Vin the vile, Lion
the lousy...


Ashun the awful, Robin the rascal, Vin the vile, Lion
the lousy...
Richard the attractive, handsome, good-looking,
alluring, lovely, charming, delightful, appealing,
engaging, ravishing, gorgeous, stunning, arresting,
glamorous, graceful, elegant, exquisite, aesthetic,
artistic, decorative, magniﬁcent, divine, drop-dead
gorgeous, cute, foxy...


Expectation come from 4 places:


1. Recognition - you see something and expect that
indicates something - “that person is obviously...”


2. Reputation - someone tells you about a person
whom you have never met.


3. Record - a ﬁle etc. telling you how someone has
done in the past


3. Record - a ﬁle etc. telling you how someone has
done in the past
4. Relationship - get to know someone and you
expect certain behaviour - this has the potential to
correct 1-3


Wilkinson makes an
important point:


Wilkinson makes an
important point:
If your initial thought
and expectation of a
student is positive
there is a high
probability of the
student performing
well - and also of you,
the teacher,
performing well.


Maxim 4: Expectations are imposed
through our attitudes and actions
Attitudes are internal. Actions are
external.
Watch a teacher relating to various
students and you know through
their body language, eye contact,
tone of voice, remarks etc. what
their expectation of the student is.
Consider this research looking at
how expectation impacts teaching.

When interacting with a class teachers with low
expectations tend to:
๏Wait less time for an answer to a question, then
give the answer or call on someone else
๏Question the student less frequently
๏Inappropriately reinforce a wrong answer from the
student
๏Don’t give helpful clues or repeat the question
๏Only give brief less informative feedback
๏Interrupt mistakes more quickly


When setting the level of achievement teachers with
low expectations tend to:
๏Criticise students more often for failure
๏Praise the students less often for success
๏Write fewer notes on papers / assignments
๏Teach at a slower, less intense pace
๏Fail to give the beneﬁt of the doubt in borderline cases
๏Usefewer of the most effective but time consuming
methods
๏Assign more busy work not meaningful projects


When relating personally to the student teachers
with low expectations tend to:
๏Fail to give positive feedback on public responses
๏Pay less attention to, and interact less frequently
๏Interact with the student privately more than
publicly
๏Have less friendly interaction
๏Smile less and limit encouraging physical touch
๏Maintain eye contact less often
๏Limit positive nonverbal communication


So, potentially low
achieving students are not
treated in the same way as
expected higher achievers.
In fact some people argue
that teachers “cause” their
students to decline by
providing them with fewer
educational opportunities
and by teaching them less
materially less skillfully.


Maxim 5: Expectations influence the
future, whether stated or unstated

Voiced or unconscious expectations still
impact others.
Praise a visiting speaker in advance and tell
the visitor how great the church is - and you
will probably have a great time.
But you don’t have to state your expectations
to have a great inﬂuence


No one knows how unstated expectations work
- but research shows they really do inﬂuence the
behaviour of others.
On a very simple level this can be done through
our body language. What do these images tell
you?


Maxim 6: Expectations impair others if
set too low or too high for too long

Unrealistic expectations
might never be attained -
leaving the person feeling
like a failure.
Expectations too low and
interest can be lost and the
person underachieves.


Your report has 5 A’s and 1 B+ -
your parents say it is very
disappointing that you got B+ -
how would you feel?
Unrealistic expectations can crush
a child. And, extremely negative
expectations can be self-fulﬁlling.
“You’re stupid, you will never
achieve anything...”
Expectations need to be realistic
and precise - not too high or too
low.

Maxim 7: Expectations empower others
when guided by love

The ultimate reason for
helping another person to
grow is love.
People who help others to
‘bloom’ are rare in life - yet
they help us to achieve and
love us all the time.
Who are they in your life?


Wilkinson tells the story
of a couple who used to
write something in a
notebook about each of
their students and then at
the end of the month read
it with the child
concerned - an interesting
idea to create conﬁdence
and belief in your
children.


What are your
expectations of the people
around you - friends,
family, church members?
Take some time to allow
them to be prayerfully
readjusted so that you can
be a people blossomer.


Questions to Consider
1. Who is the best people considered you
know? What do they do that makes them so
good?
2. Paul was a great exhorter - think of as
many examples of him exhorting people as
you can - can you use any of these?
3. Think of a situation where someone had
low expectations of you - what can you
learn by looking back on this?


Bruce Wilkinson, 7 Laws of the Learner: Law 2 expectation

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