Consequences that work

I once had students write a letter to a teacher they were disrespectful to... I get back the next day, there's a note on my desk with a list of what this student had done. Multiple students actually. And I know it would have created tension if it hadn't been resolved. So I resolved it. I looked at my planner, I'm not gonna do that lesson that I originally had planned. I'm gonna teach them how to write a letter. The students come in, I welcome them in, hope you had a great day, I'm looking forward to teaching you today. I am aware of something that happened yesterday, but we will not be discussing it in this time. This is our learning time. We'll discuss it at a time that I'm ready. That's the scene. And then I said, you know what? We're gonna learn about that something brand new today. We're gonna learn about how to write a letter. Some of the kids were like, are we learning about narratives? And I said, you're right, we are. So here's the fun part. I do it whole class to set the scene with everyone that the standard is there for everyone in the future too. Appropriate paragraphs, sign-offs. And then I said, you know what though? Some of you don't have to write a letter. Classes like, huh? I said, the ones that need to, nobody's gonna say names right now because I already had the list on my desk. But the ones that need to write a letter are the people that are going to apologize to the teacher that was in the class yesterday that you were rude and disrespectful to. And I didn't say names, I'm not gonna publicly express who those students are. The students knew who they were. You could see it in their eyes. And I said, there were actually 20 of you that had your time wasted for probably half an hour. Is that right? Yes. We didn't even get to finish our work. And I said, alright, well, you're gonna have your time back right now while some students writing an apology. You can have a bit of free time because of your respect and your positive attitude yesterday. 20 minutes goes on the timer. No students says I don't know how to do it. I taught the whole class how to do it. Some students are writing, some students are on the computer. And it made it apparent which students it was, but I mean, you wasted everyone's time yesterday. So now everyone else is gonna get their time back while you have your time wasted. If you take an ultimate to fix the situation, there's no one size fits all in teaching. Different consequences do work. But what I can tell you is after that lesson, we had relief teachers in the future. That stuff didn't happen again. Some students are writing, some students are on the computer. And it made it apparent which students it was, but I mean, you wasted everyone's time yesterday. So now everyone else is gonna get their time back while you have your time wasted.