Pizza Party

I have a runnning competition going between my two regents classes. On quizzes, tests, exams, etc., I average the grades and keep a tally of their scores for the individual assessment, plus an overall score. They have been pretty close thoughout the year with one class slightly ahead of the other. Then came the midterm exam, for which I promised the winner a pizza party. And one class really walloped the other, winning by 12 points. Today they got their pizza party and needless to say, the other class cried foul. Nevermind that I've been on their case lately for not putting in the effort and not having what I consider to be a proper work ethic for an "honors" type, accelerated, grade 8 regents biology class.

As luck would have it, that second place group is also my official class, and there's the whole "familial" dynamic here makes them feel particularly slighted. I don't know yet how I will remedy the situation. I really like my official class, but a significant number of students just want to party - clown around, make jokes, socialize, etc. I can't just reward them for nothing. And the thing is their behavior/attitude problems are an issue in homeroom period as well, and their conduct sheet is far from perfect. I would love to be able to just reward the students who do work hard and succeed, but there is no clear divide between the two groups - if you lined the class up and put the worst offenders on one side and the hardest working best behaved student on the other side, everyone else would fall along a continuum between the extremes, with no clear demarcation point between those who deserve to be rewarded and those who don't. Then of course there's the slacker who does well on the exams, and the hard worker who doesn't quite get it yet and fails the exams. It's just an impossible split.

I will discuss the issue with them tomorrow and see if we can come up with a plan. They will need to do something to earn the pizza - I don't mind spending the money once in a while or using class time if they work hard enough to deserve it. If the exam scores had been closer and their lack of effort weren't so obvious, I would have given both classes a party today.