Q: I have taught 7th grade religious education for the past four years, and for the most part, the students in my classes have behaved well and respectfully toward me. I know the majority of these children are not there by choice, and I appreciate it when they realize I am trying my best to make the class interesting and enjoyable for them. This year, though, I have three students who seem to be making it their mission to make this class as difficult for me as possible.

Last year's 6th grade teacher forewarned me that there were a few troublemakers in this class, and as a volunteer teacher, I am not sure how far I can go to set these children straight. I believe these children are not necessarily bad apples — they just seek attention from their classmates and believe their actions in my classroom don't have real-world consequences because evening religious education is not, as one of them recently stated, "real school."

Any advice you could give me to help deal with these students and engage them in a positive way in my class would be greatly appreciated.

A: Children who already have the reputation of being troublemakers won't be easy for you to manage. You will probably want some tips from their former teachers, as well as clarity regarding what your religious school policies are on discipline. Let's hope these students eventually realize that their behavior is inappropriate and they are willing to make a fresh start. You will want to begin your school year with that assumption, but perhaps it's too late for that advice at this point. Research tells us that the more children's names are called out for reprimands and poor behavior, the more they will act out and misbehave. In other words, whether it is positive or negative, these children will keep searching for more attention.

Your very next step should be to talk with the parents of these children about their behavioral issues in your class so they can support your efforts to keep the children manageable. You may even want to email these parents regularly about their children's behavior so they can respond to them with appropriate consequences. A reasonable reward at home could be an extra hour to play video games if they've been good and a negative consequence could be no video games for the rest of the day if they have caused problems.

Bible stories can actually be very interesting to children. Perhaps you could even encourage your students to act out and debate about moral issues in your class. For example, someone could play the role of David and someone else Goliath and they could try to act out what each was thinking and feeling. Helping students solve real ethical dilemmas based on their religious teaching of the day could also help to make religion come alive to them. Last, but not least, you might appoint these "trouble-makers" (one student to a class) to assist with some of the younger children. Giving them leadership responsibilities can often help them to gain a different perspective about appropriate behaviors.

For free newsletters entitled Discipline For Little, Middle and Big Kids, The Arts Are Important For Your Children and/or A United Front, send a self-addressed, stamped envelope to the address below. Dr. Sylvia B. Rimm is the director of the Family Achievement Clinic in Cleveland, a clinical professor of psychiatry and pediatrics at the Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine, and the author of many books on parenting. More information on raising kids is available at www.sylviarimm.com. Please send questions to: Sylvia B. Rimm on Raising Kids, P.O. Box 32, Watertown, WI 53094 or [email protected]. To read features by other Creators Syndicate writers and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate website at www.creators.com.

Photo credit: Thomas Quine