ABSTRACT
The touchstone for the student's learning is the agreement, or contract. Placement agreements have developed over the last ten years, so they might be different from teachers' own experience as a student if teacher qualified before this. The Learning Agreement comes from the meeting of the individual student, the practice teacher and a representative from the course programme to discuss and record the expectations of the placement. Some agencies have taken on staffs who work in a peripatetic manner, so that each placement setting gets its fair share of extra help, though not always at exactly the same time as the student is on placement. A few agencies provide extra payment for practice teaching. Some agencies, especially in the voluntary sector, have opened a discussion with teams to see how they might enhance the quality of the team's work, if not actually reducing the quantity.
