Am I being too generous with DS1's reward chart?

[Ceebee74]

We set up a reward chart when DS1 was 2.5 to try and get him to stop hurting his baby brother - it worked a treat so I continued using for other things as and when needed.

At the moment, he gets 1 star if he cleans his teeth properly after his bath (or lets me do it), he gets 1 star if he stays in bed at night (or at least only gets up to ask me to put his story CD on and goes straight back to sleep) and he gets 2 stars if he stays in bed completely and doesn't get up at all. Every time he gets 14 stars, he gets a reward which is now becoming once a week.

Is this too generous? Firstly, I am running out of things to give him - have now bought a supply of little paperback Thomas books so he can have one of these each week.

I feel if we make him get more stars, he will lose interest and it will lose it's effectiveness but, otoh, I feel he is getting too much.

Sounds like it's run its course

I don't really rate them though. Tried one with dd1 and didn't get any results from them.

I also read an interesting thread on here a few days ago - can't remember title - about over-use of reward charts and how they can be counter-productive. The book 'Unconditional parenting' was mentioned in the thread - sorry that's not much use, is it?!

How old is he now?

He is 2.9 now.

We tried it because we were desperate to stop him hurting the baby and it really worked. It has also worked fantastically well at getting him to clean his teeth and stay in bed so it has definitely worked. I am not sure though that these behaviours are ingrained enough yet to stop rewarding him (the hurting the baby has thankfully).

He has just started hitting out when he doesn't get his own way - am wondering whether it would be worth removing a star each time he hits me?

Oh I wish I could remember the thread title, it was such useful reading! ABout how we tend to 'over-reward' our children and thatthis then becomes counter-productive... the child loses the intrinsic motivation to do the things we wnt them to, because we are too busy either rewarding them for it or 'punishing' them for not doing it or doing it properly

My dd2 is 2.7. She would not repond to a star chart... she just wouldn't 'get it'. It's good yours worked re the baby-bashing but for the rest...

I mean, i battle DAILY with dd2 and her teeth. Sometimes she is a willing participant, other times she needs pinning

ANd the same with the bed thing. Some nights I have to just repeatedly take her back, with no conversation... most nights she'll go straight to sleep. That's toddlers, no?

DD1 (who was, and is, a strong-minded and willful type) wouldn't respond to star charts at dd2's age. Now, at 5.4, she's brilliant at all the daily 'looking after yourself' type stuff. He'll get there!

Sorry for the waffle

We use a chart with ds when he needs help with a particular development or behaviour issue and as soon as it is on track ie. like your ds' issue of hurting his baby brother ... we drop it until we need it again. I think you should drop it for a while or try something a little different to keep the interest there. Even when we do one we only give one star/sticker per day maximum on the chart. At the moment ds gets a sticker every now and then (to go on his top) rewarding very good behaviour.

It sounds as if you have overdone it slightly and maybe a break from it would be good. If you really need something then perhaps try the pasta jar thing I have heard others on here talk about.

Sounds like it is getting a little over-used round your gaff.

Dh has one for ds - I don't really understand the finer details but they do. Ds has to collect X number of stars to earn a prize - he's really good at not touching whatever it is until it belongs to him (dh leaves the prize in full view - if I was 5, I'd just grab the reward and run off but ds is clearly better behaved than I was, miraculously!).

If you are interested in the theory that rewards/punishments are counter productive, you could look into Alfie Kohn, "Unconditional Parenting" and "Punished by Rewards".
There have been quite a few threads about this on here.

I think this is the thread Notnowbernard is thinking of.

OSOTC, it wasn't that one...

IIRC it was started quite some time ago but was 'bumped' a few days ago (could well have been a couple of yrs old)

Lots of really interesting stuff (LONG thread!)

I just lurked on it. Reminded me of how I came to love MN

this ?

YES!

Have a sticker, OSOTC

I found it a useful thread. I think I might try and get hold of the book as well