Last week I was writing up report cards for an Introduction to Programming class I taught recently. In addition to their academic performance, students at my school are assessed on courtesy and respect in every class they take. I noticed something interesting as I was compiling scores for the class: these were the highest courtesy and respect scores that I had ever seen for a whole class.

At first I started second-guessing myself. Maybe I was seeing my students through rose-colored glasses, because I had enjoyed working on programming every morning with them. But when I asked what more I could have wanted from students in regard to how they treated themselves and others, I couldn’t think of much. Students had taken themselves more seriously, asked each other for help more consistently, offered help more readily, and treated school resources with more care than in any class I’ve seen. Students…