Lesson from children's choir:

We took the kids into the sanctuary last night to practice being on stage for their upcoming gig on Sunday (BTW, I'm a "helper", I don't actually lead the tykes). We ran through their song once, with most of the kids swaying and making faces, many not singing at all, etc. Then the director gave a short speech about how important it is not to distract the congregation from worship during the service. She also told me that on the next run-through, I was to find the three children who were doing the best job at standing still and watching the director so that they could get a piece of candy after the rehearsal. Suddenly all the extraneous behaviors stopped. All of the kids really paid attention well. I identified six who never took their eyes off the director at all, so those six got the candy. I was amazed at the enormity of change precipitated by a tiny little contest.