Level 6: The Agreement Bridge

Along with the Bull’s Eye Game, the Agreement Bridge is designed to help our most troubled students, those who are immune to penalty and punishment.

Based on Ross W. Greene’s successful book “Lost At School,” the Agreement Bridge unites challenging kids with their teachers in collaborative problem solving. The problems addressed can include, but are not limited to: conflicts with other students or the instructor, gang activity, lagging social skills, anger management, patterns of weak academic performance, poor attendance, disruptive classroom behavior. If you have a kid who cusses you out, or who brings drugs to school or who merely never does homework, the Agreement Bridge provides a flexible, entertaining environment for discovering solutions that satisfy not only the teacher, but also the rebel student.

In brief, teacher and student sit at a table separated by a ruler; the ruler symbolizes the problem that separates them.  The game allows a free flowing, often entertaining, dialogue to develop as the two players share points of view.  They trade information about their personal lives, swap descriptions of the problem that separates them, discuss smart and foolish solutions to the problem.  Eventually, teacher and student arrive at a few simple agreements which they record on a contract.

The Agreement Bridge, available as a free download on this site, is a potent tool that can be used for short, or long term counseling by teachers, administrators or peer mentors.