Sticker crazy

What is it about a shiny sticker that makes kids go crazy? I've discovered lately that the stickers I brought from Canada are both my best friend and secret weapon in the classroom. The kids know that they will be rewarded with a sticker if they complete their daily homework, and if they start to get a little too rowdy, I threaten that there won't be any stickers the next day unless they quiet down. Works like magic!

This is a picture of "Jane" showing off her growing collection of stickers. About half the kids have an English name that they either came up with themselves, or somewhere along the way someone gave them.

On my first day of teaching I was told to simply give each kid a name since learning their Korean names would be too hard for me. I didn't feel right about arbitrarily assigning someone a new name, so I just went ahead and learned their Korean names. In a way, I ended up giving them a new name anyway. Initially my butchering of their Korean names brought endless laughter, but by this point they have gotten used to my mangled pronunciation and don't give it a second thought.