Know your learners to adapt teaching early - a discussion of pre-workshop surveys

During the process of composing teaching material and preparing for a lesson, an instructor typically bears in mind an expected composition of his/her audience with respect to prior knowledge, speed of learning, and expectations. In this discussion, we would like to present our approaches to assessing these 3 dimensions before a workshop starts in order to prepare the teacher for his/her students. We will share some typical questions we survey with and explain how it helps us to target our content better. Moreover, it can provide a solid baseline for teachers with respect to preparing group activities to foster a community of learners in the classroom. The largest part of the discussion will be devoted to an exchange of experiences by the participants on assessing learner communities before they meet in class and on how to improve for future workshops.