Testing Testing

Okay. It finally got to me. All year when I've announced tests and given tests, there's ALWAYS some students absent. Then it becomes a game of, "when are you going to make up the test". Then days and literally weeks would go by before some students made up the test. They all eventually do, but really! It usually didn't annoy me TOO much, but now during this last test about 1/5 of my class was gone from each period during the test.

In the past I was diligent about mentioning and then checking up on whether the students were cutting or not, and then they had zero chance of making up the test. This year, I had other things on my plate.

I'm giving a test this week on Wednesday and Thursday (block scheduling). I mentioned ahead of time, "if you are absent the day of the test, the next time you are in class, I will put you out in the hall, and you will make up the test during class time and miss the current lesson." Hopefully, this will make it less appealing to the students to all of a sudden feel really ill on the day of the test and use that as an excuse to drag it out.

I heard another teacher at the beginning of the year announces: every time everyone is here for a test, everyone gets a bonus point(s). She found that then the students were policing each other to make sure they were there.

I guess my method will work (I hope), because either way, the students will finish the test within a week (unless they're super skipping class).