Has anyone experienced or know if the reward chart systems works long term for SEN kids..

[bournemouth]

My son is on the ASD and we have just had the last 3 years of reward charts to get him to settle or be good at school etc. The rewards are normally if your good you get time in the ICT suite or if you get up from under the table you can have time in the ICT suite or more play time. Now when my son first started school i agreed that this would be a good idea as this did work but i did question the long term affects were. Also how much praise and well dones he received for doing the most silliest things. Because he was so difficult from a young age when he attended childminders, nannies pre schools, schools i beleive that he now expects rewards for everything and i have been saying this. At home if i ask him to do anything ie pick up his dirty clothes ect he wants a reward and his behaviour gets worst. I have always argueed with the above people saying that it is just teaching him not to do anything unless he gets a reward. He is now 8 and i beleive that if so much praise was not put on him he would not be so confident saying he knows everything and that he is so great. I also beleive that if he had not had so many rewards i would still not be in a position of defiance when ever he should be doing the right things at home.

I have asked by phoneing around adult/teenage special needs centres today and asking them what they think and they all say the same that rewards work at school for the day to get the teachers to get them to do what they want but in senior school when these rewards no longer exsist or in early adult hood there behaviour is worst because they expect rewards.

I want my school to recognise that long term rewards are not effective only in the short days of school hours. My schools that he has been too all say the same. They think it is affective and that it works for them.

Please tell me what you all think..

The school DS attends rewards freely in years 7 and 8, for a range of things - attendance, charity, academic/sport, improvement etc. It's much harder thereafter, but really helps to motivate in those tricky transition years when they are after all still children and we are expecting quite a lot of them, in my view particularly of boys. HTH

I'll come back but quick answer is that is stupid to employ any strategy for behaviour without having a clear exit strategy, because otherwise all you are doing is managing the behaviour, not teaching the child skills to be independent and self-regulate.

I understand exactly what you are saying bournemouth. I had similar fears about reward charts when my DS was younger. We used them both at primary school (in the infants) and at home. I have to say that they sort of just fizzled out really and when I went on a Triple P course(aimed at parents of teenagers) when DS was 11 and came home with new reward systems - it lasted all of a week with DS saying "I am sick of reward charts"!

His mainstream secondary school just uses the same reward/punishment system for him as it does for the other 1000 pupils at the school ie House points, blue referal sheets - for good work/behaviour/actions, post cards home for good test results etc and likewise the same punishment systems. It has worked well for DS as he does not want to be treated differently (although he has 1:1 TA support - but even that is discreet). In fact DS is now at the point where he thinks its nerdy to get house points so he doesn't bother to hand the cards in - as when you get a certain number of points, you are awarded a certificate in assembly - which he thinks is nerdy!!!!

At home he is expected to do things without reward - although like a typical teenager (14) he either conveniently forgets or argues about why he should have to do it!! The exception of course is things like mowing the lawn for which he is paid.

I guess it depends on the ability of the child - as you've probably worked out my DS is 'high functioning' ASD. In preparation for adult life, when you work your reward only comes once a month in your pay cheque - unless you happen to be lucky enough to have a boss who remembers to thank/praise the staff on a regular basis, so maybe a reward system with less frequent 'prizes' might be appropriate for your DS with a gradual weaning off by the time he gets to Secondary school - where a good secondary will have its own general reward system for everyone.

Its been a while since i looked at this. thank you every one for your comments. Son has been finding year 3 tough with the changes and also having to sit still and so was excluded from school last week. So i had alot on my plate. But thank you..