We do math in here.

One of my classroom rules is "Work Hard" and it's one of my favorites. When my classes got all shaken up at the start of the new term I got a lot of new students. Most of them are adapting to my class well, but some of them are struggling.  There is one in particular (we'll call him B) who is having a hard time adjusting to the way things are in my class.  B is one of those students who likes to sleep in class and fail every test. I'm not okay with that. I make sure to call on B any time he looks like he isn't paying attention (which is a lot) and chastise him when he puts his head down or gets distracted by his pen (Because for real? Your pen is more interesting than me? That's just offensive.).  One day he was getting particularly frustrated with me because I kept badgering him to stay on task and do the problem on his whiteboard and talk to his neighbor about this and answer this question.  I said things like "We don't doodle on our whiteboards in this class" and "We don't put our heads down in this class" and "We don't throw paper wads in this class".  Finally he got so frustrated that he yelled "APPARENTLY WE DON'T DO ANYTHING IN THIS CLASS!" One student, who has definitely given me their share of problems, said something that validated my whole life: "Yes we do B, we do math in here."