When students returned for the first day of class at Ring Lardner Middle School Tuesday in Niles, they were greeted with more than just new books and few new faces.

During second hour, the approximately 440 seventh- and eighth-grade students were also introduced to a new type of class period called “Connections.”

Principal Doug Langmeyer described the daily 26-minute block as a more structured version of a homeroom period.

There are between 20 and 22 students per “Connections” class, he said, and they will stay with the same teacher the entire year. It happens during second hour.

“It isn’t going to be study hall… it isn’t the time to come in and get homework done that you didn’t finish last night,” he said. “It will be a good use of time.”

What the time will be used for, Langmeyer explained, is focusing on academic and non-academic skills that typically are not covered in core classes of math, science, language arts and social studies.

Students will do character building exercises and learn about the values of organization, social responsibility, having a positive attitude, citizenship and living with integrity.

Some days students will learn how to improve their study skills while other days they might learn tips for managing money.

It will also be a time when teachers can push a concept called “Mindset Mondays” — a major initiative at Ring Lardner this year designed to teach kids the meaning of a having growth mindset.

“A lot of kids come to us thinking they don’t have the ability to do well. We have to change that,” Langmeyer said. “We are teaching kids that attitude and effort can take you great places and that you aren’t born with fixed intelligence. That can change.”

Teachers working in teams get to come up with the plan for each day, Langmeyer said, so it will vary from one room to another.

Katie Myles, an eighth grade language arts teacher, said she is excited about the new time block. Although they did not get to it Tuesday, Myles said she is looking forward to an exercise where students will write down something they struggled with last year and figure out how to correct it.

“It’s about what can I do to improve myself? It also goes with the growth mindset,” she said. “I think it will be good character builder.”

Langmeyer said “Connections” came about when the high school switched to a seven period day. Because the schools share some teachers, it opened up a free period of time that needed to be filled at Ring Lardner. Langmeyer said faculty came up with the idea of a structured homeroom period to make the best use of the time.