Reward Systems

I was on a message board this morning and there was somebody asking about rewards systems and what others do. I shared what works in this house, and I got feedback that people quite liked the idea so I thought I would share it with you lot.

We do a marble system. Marbles because we have a lot of them, they are small and don't take up space, and the kids quite like them. You can use anything little really.

For us, one marble = 10c. You can make it worth as much or as little as you want. Or money may not be your child's currency, think about what really gets them going. Some it may be computer/screen time (so one marble may equal 5mins computer time or something), it could be quality time together (20 marbles is a trip to the park with Mum..) - find what works with your child. Cold hard cash is my 7yo's currency. My 4yo however, he doesn't seem to have any currency! We have tried various things, no computer/tv, no treat food (none of my baking!), and all that jazz, nothing seems to be what he cares about enough to actually have any effect. So he does cash too simply because his brother does. It does work, just not as well.

Then you need to think up a list of jobs and/or behaviours. Some ideas that we have used in the past or are using now:

Getting the washing in

Putting away the dishes

Bedrooms are tidy before bed

Put clean washing in drawers

Set the table for dinner

or other age appropriate jobs

We also have a marble for "Positive attitude". This means if they are mean to each other, there is no marble. This means if they don't do as they are asked, they get no marble. This means if they are sulky or full of attitude, they get no marble. It's a broad one, but ensures pretty decent behaviour most of the time ("do you need to lose your attitude marble today?").

You might like to add in a marble for keeping pants dry if your child is still toilet training, or whatever else you want them to work on.

We dish out marbles every night before bed (or if we forget, after breakfast the following day). Once they reach $5 worth, we exchange it for cash. Santa brought them wallets for Christmas so they keep their cash in there. They are quite proud of their pocket money.