Parenting as a behavior consultant: "The Reward Chart of All Things Awesome"

Before I became a parent I always wondered what it would be like to be a parent and a behavior analyst. For over a decade, my job has been to get kids to who don't eat to eat, kids who don't sleep to sleep, kids who don't talk to communicate and kids who don't play nice to start taking turns and sharing. A collegaue of mine joked that when she eventually has kids, they will be born potty-trained and talking in full sentences.

Well apparently mine didn't get that memo and I was not spared from the sobbing tantrums that make me questions for a second why children are a blessing from above. Sometimes the tear-fest is kind of funny like when Natallie had a melt down because Noah grabbed her napkin at the breakfast table.

"Noah touched my napkin!!!"

But sometimes the tantrums for lack of a better word, just suck. Over the last few months, Natallie's outbursts could not longer be explained by the "I think she teething" or the "Oh, she just missed her nap" excuses that seems to cover any displeasing behavior from birth to toddler-hood.

Without getting into the mommy war zone of whether or not spanking is OK, I wanted to try what I recommend to families I work with first. So we started a token economy aka "The Reward Chart of All Things Awesome"

If you've never tried "The Reward Chart of All Things Awesome" before or tried it but it didn't work, here's how you do it:

1. Pick one to three behaviors you want to change. Choose things that are reasonable for child to do. I want my 3-year-old to meal plan for the week and scrub the mildew from our showers, that's not happening right now.

2. Define exactly what that behavior looks like and word it positively. Which means, "don't be whiny baby" or "stop driving mom crazy" is not positively worded or well defined. Write it out so your child knows exactly what you want to see more (or less) of.

3. Decide how many tokens your child needs to earn before he/she gets the reward. If your child has never done this before, start small. One family I worked with is having the child earn 100 tokens for an iPad. It didn't work. The child gave up after the earning the first 10 tokens.

4. Decide on what the reward is. Make sure your child actually wants that thing. Your child should earn the reward pretty quickly if you've never done a token system before. If your child is earning the reward several times a day, make sure the reward is enticing but not so grandiose that it backfires. You don't want your child to be earning a dozen ice cream cones a day or maxing our your credit card. It's not supposed to be a bribe, these rewards could be things your child usually gets anyways but now you restrict access to them until they earn it. It could be 2 tokens = favourite snack or 5 tokens = a TV show or a special art activity.  Or maybe it could be outings like going to the library or a movie. Don't pick things that you're going to be doing regardless of whether or not your child will earn the tokens. (e.g., earning a trip to Disneyland isn't a good choice unless you're ready to shred those tickets if your child doesn't make it)

5. Decide when you'll give out tokens. Are you going to give out a token every time your child does that behavior, every other time, or whenever you remember? Decide ahead of time and stick to it. For one family I worked with, they had a timer that went off at random times during the day and if she had 3 stars on her chart when the timer went off, she got her reward. If she didn't, her mom set the timer again and she would try to earn enough stars for the next time. Another family had 4 "check in" times a day and if he didn't yell or hit mom in any of those time periods he would get a star. At the end of the day, if he had at least 3 out of 4 stars, he got some time on the iPad before bed.

For Natallie, we give out tokens on a variable ratio which means she never really knows if she will get a token or not. Sometimes she does but sometimes she doesn't. When she doesn't I just say praise her and say something like, "Awesome opossum! I really liked how you shared your snack with Noah!"  This is great because as those good behaviors occur more naturally and frequently, she doesn't come to expect a token every time but because she never knows if she will get a token, she keeps on doing it.

"nice playing with your brother!"

6. Think about whether or not your child is just going to earn tokens or if it is possible to lose tokens too. This is called response cost- losing tokens for problem behavior. For Natallie, losing a token is a million times worse than a spanking. I'm pretty sure the entire neighborhood heard her wails the one time Dad removed a hard earned sticker off her chart.

That's pretty much it. We're on round 4 of it now. She's really into My Little Pony and she's earned Rainbow Dash, Pinkie Pie and Twilight Sparkle (side note: yes, I know all the pony names and their associated cutie marks). I wrap up a pony and put it in a special box and after she earns her 10 tokens she finds out which is the next pony. The ponies she is earning is actually part of a My Little Pony board game and the ponies are the playing pieces. It's a game I would of bought for her anyways but now she's earning each playing piece and then earning the game board. It's going to be a month until she actually earns all the pieces to the board game but it makes it really motivating.

"I got Twilight Sparkle!!!"

The next important step is called "fading" that that just means slowly raising the bar so it takes a bit longer to earn tokens or a adding some things to your child's "to do" list so it's a bit harder to earn the reward. For us, we're keeping the list of behaviors the same but giving out tokens a bit less. The first time around it took about 3 days to earn 10 tokens, then 5 days to earn 10 tokens, then about a week to earn 10 tokens. She is still doing all those good behaviors just as frequently but I just give out tokens less and natural reinforcement like praise, high 5's, hugs and kisses more.

You'll know you're doing it right when the good behaviors are occurring more and more naturally and you  remember that yes indeed, children a blessing from Above.