A rewards system that works!

Motivate your students to participate and keep practicing in the target language with these extra credit tickets!

Download a copy here !

Les billets / Los boletos –

a rewards system to keep your students speaking in the target language

How the system works :

The system is simple. We print off many pages of the tickets at the beginning of each marking period and cut them out. Whenever a student answers a question correctly, performs a dialogue in front of the class, or shows particular enthusiasm for learning a new language, we give them a ticket. It is also a great reward for winning a game, practicing a conversation especially well, or singing a song with enthusiasm. 

We are extremely generous with our tickets, and we find that students will do just about anything to earn one. Once the student earns a ticket, they write their name on the back right away and store it in an envelope in their folder. (Also, to keep students from counterfeiting, we print the tickets on the color printer or on colored paper. Another trick is to photocopy them and stamp them with a rubber stamp.)

Students are responsible to keep track of the tickets they earn, and at the end of the marking period, they turn them in. For our purposes, each ticket is worth one fifth of a point, so they need five billets to earn one extra credit point.

On est très généreux !

This works well because we also implement a "Liste d'anglais” (English list) system. If a student is caught speaking English, the student’s name goes on a list and a point comes off their grade, so they need five tickets to get their name off of the list. The generosity with which we distribute tickets provides grace when we take points away, and students always know they have a chance to earn their points back if they accidentally speak English.

For those of you looking to increase your students' use of the target language or wanting to find a fresh way to motivate your students, please give this system a try!

Download a copy here.