Breakthrough!!

Chalyse was feeling her usual self yesterday. I just thought I would give the update, although that's not why I'm writing.

About a month ago I gave a unit test in my English classes. My 8th grade class did horribly. Half of the class REFUSED to take the test for most of the period, and instead sat and talked, despite my best efforts to quiet them, separate them, punish them, etc. Today, on the other hand, I gave another unit test, and every single person took the test quietly. They even did the writing sections!!!!!

How did I work the miracle? Besides a LOT of praying, I came up with a system that I call "Respect Points." The way it works is that I divided them into teams, and they earn points for each member of their team who is on time doing what they're supposed to be doing, and additional points for when their entire team is being respectful. They lose points when any person on their team does something or says something disrespectful. At the end of the period, the winning team gets to leave 1 minute early while the other teams get to stay and practice being respectful. If a team has negative points, they get to stay one minute for each negative point. If the losing team(s) have less than 10 points, they get to stay 30 seconds into their break.

It has worked like a charm. I just hope these lessons in respect carry over into the rest of their lives, but most especially into high school. We seem to have a worse problem there than in the middle school with respect.