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Helen Dempster
12-07-2010, 03:35 PM
...and what do you offer as 'treats', stickers or something more, ie a cheap toy/book etc? I've got a little mindee (soon to be 5yrs) who's behavour is...challenging, shall we say? He screams blue murder if he doesn't get what he wants "NOW!" For example, I was going to make him a sandwich just now, when I received a text from mum saying she was going to pick him up early...literally seconds away. Therefore, I didn't have time to make a sandwich for him, but explained that mummy was coming early and how good was that, and that he could have one when he got home. He got himself into a right old state, screaming, shouting, made himself all blotchy! I'm one of those people who can let them get on with it, the noise doesn't bother me, as long as the child is safe etc. His teacher also called me over today to 'have a little word' because he'd been repeatedly hitting another boy over the head cos he wanted the bike to himself. I spoke to mum about it when she got here and suggested we work together with a reward chart. She said it's difficult for her, cos she doesn't have any of this at home! Personally, I think it's cos he's not told to share/wait and is given whatever he wants, when he wants it (but I don't want to say that to her obviously!). Anyway, she said that was a good idea and we'll try that. I was just wondering if you've all found them to work well, or if I should try another approach of some kind?

Sorry this is so long....I didn't intend it to be when I started out :blush:

miss mopple
12-07-2010, 03:49 PM
Reward charts do wonders in my experience. We were having real trouble with DD2 messing at bed time and having issues going into preschool so I made her a chart from DLTK site and within a week she had competely turned around as she was so desperate to get her stickers :thumbsup:

The treats at the end of each week for her were things like a new comic/trip to the library to rent a dvd/ charity shop to choose a new book

Good luck- hope it works for you too

Mouse
12-07-2010, 04:10 PM
For the right child, rewards charts can be very effective. With some children though, they just don't work.
I'd say definitley give it a go and hope your mindee is one of the children who responds well to it!

When I've done them, rewards have been things like stickers, comic, an extra trip to the park etc. It needs to be something he really wants. For long term charts (ie a month or so) I do a small weekly reward, then something bigger at the end of a month.

In the past I've even done things like get a filled pencil case & take out the contents. Each day the child can have something back to go in the pencil case, so over time they're filling it back up again.

Tribe_mummy
12-07-2010, 04:12 PM
I think they definitely work! I have used them for my 4 eldsest and as soon as my youngest is needing one I will start her on one too! Small treats such as stickers or "pocket money toys" work a treat! With the older ones I let them have half an hour on the DS or something similar. I swear by all of supernanny techniques!! Dread to think of the state my household would be in if I didn't use them lol x

Good luck!!

Helen Dempster
12-07-2010, 05:25 PM
I think I'll definitely try this technique reading all your comments, there's not a negative one there :) I saw somewhere (can't remember where now), where someone made a 'robot' (think it was called Robbie) out of cardboard boxes, and filled it with goodies - ie sweets, pocket money toys etc and if they behaved well, then they got to put their hand in and choose an item from Robbie the Robot. I love this idea, I might even do that too :D

miss mopple
12-07-2010, 05:27 PM
The robot sounds like a great idea. May have to nick it myself :laughing:

Blue Boy
12-07-2010, 05:35 PM
We have tried them on a few of our mindees over the years. It works for some but not for others.

Tribe_mummy
12-07-2010, 05:38 PM
Love the idea of the robot, was going to make robots with the 3 middle ones in the hols so we could incorporate this...fab idea!! Thanks x