I’m so excited to get started these weekly posts!  Can I just tell you how many times I’ve thought, “Hmm, this would be a great WFMW post!  If only I had a blog so I could participate.”  Well, now I do and last week I started to panic because I couldn’t remember one single item of the tons and tons of them that I’d thought of over the past year.  But after I took some nice deep, cleansing breaths (of which I’m fairly experienced after four drug-free births. Ouch!) and ran up and down the block in a frienzied panic a couple times, I started to remember a few.  So, after too much ado, here’s my very first-ist WFMW post:

HERO POINTS

As a mother of four little ones, I am always looking for ways to reward good behavior.  Because, frankly, sometimes those episodes were often overshadowed by the not so good ones.  After reading an article from a child-rearing magazine, we adopted their Hero Point system.  It’s very simple.  Award the child with a hero point every time he/she does something good without being asked.  After a child has accumulated five (or whatever number you deem appropriate) points, they get to choose from two rewards for the whole family to participate in.  Thus, making them a “hero” to the whole family also.

I’ve had two different systems for keeping track of hero points.  For the first one, I made a sign with all three kids names on it and under each name was a hook.  I made up three different sets of hero(ine) cards out of construction paper that I covered in contact paper (for durability) and used a hole-punch to make a hole at one end.  The cards sat in a little pocket attached to the sign.  Whenever a hero point was awarded, the child got to pick out a hero(ine) card and hang it on their hook.  Since then, I’ve redone my kitchen a little and now have several blackboards hanging on one wall.  So I made one of them our Hero Point board. 

  

Hubby and I have broken things down into three catagories regarding our children’s rewards: Things that are rewarded with money, things that are rewarded with Hero Points and things that are rewarded with praise only (things that everyone pitches in to do because we’re a family).  Hero Points are only awarded by a parent (or sitter).  A child can’t run up and ask for a hero point, a good deed/behavior must be recognized by the parent/sitter.  That helps to keep me on my toes, looking for age-appropriate behavior to reward.

Rewards can be anything you want.  We find that ice cream or a movie rental are two great ones for our kids to choose from.  But it could be a picnic in the park, a family game night with their choice of games, or whatever activity your kids like to do that you can do as a family. 

Hope this gives you some ideas of ways to reward your child(ren)’s good behavior.  And be sure to check out Rocks In My Dryer for more great ideas.