Positive Parenting

During the summer Zach went through a stage. We ran out of things to take away from him as punishment. He didn't care. So we sat down and talked about it.

"We need to be more respectful to each other. I can't just punish you. I want to reward the good things you do too."

It's around the same time he asked for an allowance. We have always gotten him a prize for being extra good. It was time to combine the two. So we introduced a points system.

He can earn points by doing thing like helping unload the groceries or being extra well behaved. But, we can take away points when he is behaving badly. Points are easy to earn and easy to loose.

We take the price of something with tax and round it up to the nearest 5. Example, he had to earn 25 points for the $20 legos he got yesterday. Then he can cash in those points to receive the gift. He's now at 0 points because he received his prize last night. He earned 25 but along the way he lost about 15.

How many points do I give or take? I judge it based on the situation. Most of the time it's one or two points. With groceries he gets a point for each trip to the car and back. However, all trips but the last one have to be a manageable size. He gets an extra point for putting the groceries away. Most earned points are based on really good behavior over a certain period of time. 30 minutes = 1 point. I don't reward regular good behavior. That's expected. I reward the really good behavior and times when I know it's an effort for him to be good.

Those points are important to him. It's an opportunity to reward his good behavior. He knows we have noticed his good behavior. But, he also knows he'll loose them too for bad behavior. He works hard for those points. I give him three chances to fix his behavior before taking those points away. Most of the time, he does better and doesn't loose the points.

I think overall it's a good idea to award good behavior and punish bad behavior. We all have to find the method that works for our kid. Most of the time, what kids really want is attention. If you only pay attention when they do something bad, they will be in trouble a lot. If you are paying attention when they are doing something good too, they are more likely to continue doing positive things.

The point system is teaching him about what things cost too. We have often told him "no" to a toy because of it's cost. He's old enough now to understand what we mean by that. He knows it took him a month to earn those 25 points. Now he understands why we are only willing to get him what we know he will get a lot of use out of.

Positive parenting means positive kids.