Reward tokens but want to focus on different behaviour for each child...ideas?!!!

[nessynoodle]

Hi all

So I have one child who doesn't always eat his dinner (he either eats well or terribly, making a fuss and leaving most of it...have been consistent in giving him a chance then taking dinner away, then he always decides he wants it back after a while, haven't given in so he gets the message but doesn't seem to work.)

Another two siblings I care for are playing up for their mum every morn, not getting ready on time, one of them more so messing around, getting upset, everyone becoming stressed out and arriving at my house in a flap, mum late for work!

So I have had an idea for the dinner problem and thought I could try to incorporate it into their routine too to encourage them to get ready. So really want to try to use it as an all round rewards system for all children in my care, whilst allowing me to alter it in order tot ackle more specific behaviour issues with particular children.

So the idea started as dinner tokens - you finish dinner and bring me an empty plate and in return get a token. After you have how ever many tokens you get a treat, eg. at the end of the week if you have 4 tokens or more you can have a tasy pudding like chocolate, or perhaps you can have one sweet per token....

However the other children rarely have any problems with eating dinner and I would like to tackle the morning thing - so thought I could allocate different areas to different children - e.g. dinner duty for one child - if he brings me 5 empty plates they get 5 tokens for the pot. Two children could then be on tidy up duty, allocating different jobs to different children during tidy up time then showing me its clean and taking tokens to pot. More of a team work thing and then we count the tokens at end off week and rewards are given accordingly to everyone... Not sure they are old enough to be allocated this kind of responsibility as it may cause arguements etc.......just trying to include them all whilst also making sure I am addressing the problems - obviously the getting ready in the morning thing is tricky as it happens at home..

Not sure if this is a good idea, I think the original one is but maybe I'm trying to make it too complicated by bringing in too many aspects of their behaviour and routine..SUGESTIONS PLEASE!!!! Hope this makes sense too haha

[blue bear]

I did the collective rewards with a group of 6-8 year olds and it worked brilliantly, it was manners and general positive behaviour I aimed at, so if they said please they got a token, sat when asked etc. The children encouraged each other to do well so their pot would fill up.
I ran it for 3 weeks then it naturally tailed away as behaviour was no longer an issue and praise was reward enough.
No reason why it wouldn't work in a childminding group.

[nessynoodle]

I did the collective rewards with a group of 6-8 year olds and it worked brilliantly, it was manners and general positive behaviour I aimed at, so if they said please they got a token, sat when asked etc. The children encouraged each other to do well so their pot would fill up.
I ran it for 3 weeks then it naturally tailed away as behaviour was no longer an issue and praise was reward enough.
No reason why it wouldn't work in a childminding group.

I think they would encourage each other but the younest is not yet 3 and eldest is 5 1/2. Some of the personalities tend to clash at times and I worry one in particular may be bossy and others may get frustrated....its a tricky one. I suppose general positive behaviour would be the way forward so they didn't know exactly when they would get them but when they did that beaviour would be encouraged and praised and they might keep it up!