The only thing that I have found to work thus far is taking away my students' 10 minute in between class break. I teach several classes ranging in size from 20 -50 students. Each class starts with 100 points for the lesson, every time they talk while I or my co-teacher is talking they lose 1 point, if they are sleeping I deduct 3 points and if they hit each other I deduct 5 points. Each time they accumulate 10 negative points, I add 2 minutes on to the class. This has become fairly effective, especially if I point out the students that are causing them to lose points. The rest of the class will yell at those students. Also, I make it a point to have the class say "Thank you" to the student or students that make them get to -10 points.
I must note, that this doesn't work with all of my classes. However, getting a class of 20-50, 14 to 16 yr. old boys to sit down, shut up and listen is hard no matter how you look at it. I still have 3 classes that for whatever reason either do not believe that I will actually take their entire break away, or simply don't care. Thus far, this method has not worked on them, but I have been able to control several classes that my co-teachers have been unable to. Any pointers on dealing with unruly students would be welcomed.
I also bribe them with YouTube and Vimeo videos of soccer matches, funny commercials and movie trailers. It's the only thing that really gets their attention to start a class, and they'll usually do just about anything to watch a 2 minute clip of a soccer match.
