How to deal with my 5 year old’s disappointment at not winning star of the week?

[Peachballoon]

The child who wins star of the week gets to take home the class teddy for the weekend.
He started reception six weeks ago and two of the friends he plays with have won it, plus four others and he’s really gutted each Friday, in tears and angry, saying “why don’t I ever get it?!”

I do suspect he is ND, as he shows traits, but we haven’t had an official diagnosis as yet.

I’m just wondering how anyone else manages this kind of thing?

I hate star of the week, attendance awards, school council/popularity contest etc it’s rubbish. Dc4 has got more irritated each week as he has hasn’t won’ it yet, although he did get an effort award for being the only child able to name vegetables. Dc2 is solid, performs well, achieves above her age & peers, good, kind kid. She went through the whole of yr1 without receiving any star of the week, or effort awards. She is rarely recognised for anything, and it stings. Today star of the week in Dc3’s class went to the kid who threw a chair at the table of their classmates, Dd being on that table on Monday. But they ‘had worked really hard at applying different vocabulary this week’. Absolute farce along with attendance certificates that reward either the ‘lucky’ that don’t ever catch anything or the selfish parents who insist on sending sick kids & spread it to everyone else. Don’t ever reward prioritising health or following the ‘rules’.

I'd mention to the teacher that he really wanted the teddy. You'd hope that people who teach 4/5 year olds would be empathetic.
I'd say "I hope you don't think this is cheeky of me but I just wanted to let you know that x really wants that teddy"
there will be other children in the class who aren't bothered.

Every kid in the class will win the Star Award by the end of the year. They don't actually give it to the child producing the best work because then the same kids would win it every week. Its just given for inclusivity to get all kids trying.

It really isn’t always the naughty ones who get it first. I have two DS, one with ADHD who pushed all the boundaries at school and questions the teachers, and another people pleaser who loves the class environment, loves to learn and concentrates well. Which do you think has already got star of the week this term, and which do you think routinely gets it in the spring/summer term (he’s never been last, thankfully, but one year he was last but one to get it!).

At my DC’s school, the kids who get it early are the best behaved (they announce it for every year each week on the school’s tapestry).

Agree with all the other advice but a word of caution - I had similar when my DS was in reception. It got to July (end of school year) and he still hadn’t had the class teddy. As he was quiet and well behaved the teacher had totally overlooked him for a year. He didn’t understand why the disruptive kids had taken the teddy home multiple times. I had to write a note in his homework diary and he finally brought the teddy home in the second to last week of term 😢

I used to teach secondary aged kids. For fun I used to have a chocolate advent calendar for my tutor group. Only one kid could open it each day. I was astonished how competitive the kids were to open the day and get the tiny little chocolate. Most of the kids probably had a whole chocolate advent calendar at home to themselves anyway.

I hate..attendance awards

I agree with you there. Bad enough when you’re ill as a kid without the realisation you’ve missed out on an award as well.

i wish every infant school teacher would read the book Punished by Rewards. Stickers and teddies etc are not tools used to model and reward good behaviour or extra effort etc, They are means to control children and train them to compete rather than collaborate and they create significant negative and unintended long-term consequences. Someone upthread admitted to being cognisant of using them this way, but it’s depressing reading many of the replies. Every single piece of research highlights the harms they do, but tragically they will never stop being used.

What are the long term harmful consequences of rewarding children with stickers etc that studies have proven?

I’m sceptical. I mean this has been a thing for decades for every child in the land at primary school. I’m not convinced it’s a tragedy.

They could all read it and most likely agree with it, but management will be telling them what they have to do.

There's research showing that exterbnal rewards inhibit learners' self motivation as they only want the reward and stop seeing the inherent value and satisfaction in completing the work.

Seems pretty obvious really, a teddy will work in reception when they care about that sort of thing, but most children that age are really keen anyway. By the time they are a bit older they are thoroughly disillusioned by all these meaningless rewards and they no longer work, but a proportion of children have also lost the love of learning and it's progressively harder to motivate them.

Fewer external rewards in the early years would probably be better in the long run

God, I hate primary for this kind of shit. it does untold damage to the quiet well behaved kids

So glad my kids are at secondary and beyond now!

Absolutely. My children have never suffered from not bringing home a star of the week teddy.
In the 90’s when they were taking GCSE’s there started a thing amongst some of their friends where parents were offering an amount of money per “A” grade they got. I didn’t engage in this at all ( didn’t have spare cash anyway in those days) and my children were still motivated. And happy to just enjoy a celebratory family meal on results day.

I’ve realised reading that back that I probably come over as a boring old fashioned sort of teacher!

I agree with you

I'm shocked that the chair throwing child didn't get any consequences for that

Fair points @WillowCraft

However, I think there’s a place for rewards. At it’s simplest a sticker is essentially a Well done that appeals to small children. Older children and adults should take pride in their own achievements and be encouraged to do so but it’s always nice to have a bit of recognition or a pat on the back (from loved ones, your boss or an official body) whatever age you are.

From the examples on this thread, I don’t think the premise of Star of the Week is harmful.
It’s the way it’s mishandled and not used inclusively by a minority of teachers that’s the problem.

Well back in the late 90s and 2000s when my children were at primary school there was absolutely non of this . The children all had a day when they took their favourite toy to school and had 5 mins in the morning to talk about their toy. It worked and it stopped all of the ‘my child is amazing ‘ rubbish!

I might be doing it wrong but that’s exactly what I told my child who’s in reception. When he told me X got it I said that’s because he’s usually naughty so gets more fuss when he isn’t.

I think you sound like one of the good ones- one of those teachers that actually really cared about every child!

I have really fond memories of a couple of my primary school teachers. There are always a few that leave a good mark on you.

My boy is in Y2 now and they do the same thing. Every kid will get it eventually. While my son gets excited that he might be star of the week each week, we often talk about the child who did get it, how proud they must be of themselves and I ask DS if he's noticed anything about them that he thinks they deserved to get it for this week, and actually he usually tells me something almost immediately. It's a nice way for him to recognise achievement in other kids and feel pleased for them rather than disappointment for himself. I know that he's a well-behaved, hardworking kid at school so he definitely gets recognition where it's due - housepoints, star of the day, stickers etc.

Both my children in primary have had SOTW this year. My eldest got
It the first week!

Both are extremely well behaved and work hard at school.

Why have the both had it? Because dc1 is below target in an area and they tired very hard didn't achieve expected then worked on it and tried in their test again and did well, the extra effort they put in was rewarded.

Dc2 has multiple SEN (not behaviour issues) and has multiple interventions 1:1 for this, they work much harder than most in the class every single day. So why shouldn't that be rewarded?

Every child will get SOTW, but some will get it sooner than others and that's ok. It is better to teach your child that it is good to keep working hard, they will get it eventually. Running to the teacher complaining at this early stage is not going to help your child (if you think they are on child 29 of 30 and he hasn't had it then yes have a quiet word). In the meantime maybe work on their emotional resilience and understanding of others. It's hard at that age.

Thank you, I always tried to be fair to every child.
Teaching has become a completely different profession. I used to love nurturing little ones, but everything is so pressured and prescriptive now.

Tell him that the kids who play up the most, those who are loudest, the ones whose parents complain the most will always be the ones who get the rewards.

Somebody on here told their dd this and she went to school and repeated this to her classmates causing offence to parents of kids who won multiple times and embarrassment to the teacher who didn't want to discuss this with the kids. 😬