Bribery and Competition Works Wonders

FYI--If you're not a teacher or don't really care about a genius CST prep program, feel free to scan down and look at my bright classroom walls and move on.

The CSTs are coming and my students are prepared. In order to prove it and do some "fun" review, the annual team competition has started. This genius plan was not my complete creatiovAlthough the chart above makes the system look pretty complicated, the game is pretty simple.

Some of the basics:

1. Each class has eight teams
2. Each team is made up of four students of all levels (one high, one low, and two middles--based on last years CST scores and modified based on the semester final and class grades).
3. Each team works together to answer released CST questions in a packet.
4. From the state website, I took all the released questions and broke it down into five packets.
5. Teams are encouraged to talk about WHY they chose each answer, holding mini debated when they disagree with each other on a question's answer.
6. After a set time (2 minutes per question), we show our answers one at a time and I mark down which groups get the questions right/wrong.
7. If more than two groups get the question wrong, as a class we go over the answer choices and volunteers can answer proving questions (ie: who can tell me why answer a is a better choice than answer c? who can tell me the defintion of ambiguity?)
8. As soon as we grade the packet, we start the next packet and the cycle continues for seven school days.

Why do my burnt out ninth graders (who have taken CSTs every year since kindergarden) want to participate in this competition??

Bribery and Competition (period)

Bribery is the most important aspect: There are some pretty kick butt prizes!

• class party
• pizza party
• breakfast with me
• a super cool team who gets to come to all three

Competition is the second most important aspect for all people, let alone ninth graders and more specifically ninth grade BOYS (who tend to be more difficult):

• Everything they do well earns them points.
• Their points help the class as a whole and their team as a whole (up and down and across on that big chart).
• If they have the most points in their period or in the team, they get stars.
• Stars get them the "big" pizza prize.
• Also, the team that gets the most questions right, gets to come to everything!
• Their scores, points, and stars are posted instantly and updated daily. All I have to do it walk over and give one team a point and everyone copies that team (positive recognition works people!)

Some "working" pictures for you during team time.