Using Rewards and Reinforcement: A Real Life Example
A real life example in a lesson on reinforcement came to me when I was asked a question by my sister about getting her three year old to dress herself. My niece isn’t a fan of dressing herself and my sister reported that at dressing time, she will throw a fit and refuse to put on her clothes. She’s happy to wear clothes and likes picking out outfits, but the physical demand of actually putting the clothes on is non preferred for her.
I can imagine that this is a scenario that many of us are familiar with. How many times have you seen that kid still in pajamas at the school drop off gate bringing big sister to school? You know that tired mom didn’t have it in her to make that little guy get dressed before walking to school. We have all been that tired mom. (We have also probably also been that tired mom who is also still in pajamas and doesn’t want to get herself dressed, but I digress…). But, anyway, going back to this situation, what do we do when our kids don’t want to do something that we want them to do?
In each individual scenario, we want to identify the goal or task that we would like the child to complete, identify the reward to use to increase their motivation and make a plan for how to distribute it.
Step 1: Identify the Task (What SPECIFICALLY do you want your child to do? Consider the difficulty level of the task and match it to their skills and developmental level. Start small with something your child can reasonably be successful with.)
Step 2: Identify the time to work on the task or skill (What will be a good time of day for you to work on this goal or skill. Most children will complete tasks more readily if opportunities to practice are naturally occurring, but it may also be appropriate to work on skills in isolation during a specific learning time.)
Step 3: Identify the Reward (What will motivate the child to do the tas? Match the power of the reward to the difficulty level of the task. The ultimate goal would be for a child to earn social praise alone for completing a task, but this isn’t always possible.)
Step 4: Plan for Delivery of the reward (If the task is completed, how will you be delivering the reward to the child? Is it something you are able to deliver immediately?)
Step 5: Plan for the communication with your child so they understand the expectation (Consider your child’s language level and present the direction and plan in a way they can understand. Visuals may be helpful.)
Step 6: Plan for what to do if the child won’t/ can’t do the task (Consider prompting needs, your child’s abilities and your ability to follow through.)
In this example, the task is: “Putting on Clothes.” We then need to identify the time we would like this to happen. For this example, the desired time is: “Before Bedtime”. Ok, so in thinking about this set up, we need to analyze the motivation here. For the parent, bedtime is probably pretty motivating. At bedtime, we are tired and looking forward to getting our littles down for the night so we can finish up our days and go to bed ourselves (read: go binge Netflix). So, for the PARENTS, the child getting into the pajamas means it’s time to go to sleep soon which is likely VERY MOTIVATING. But, for the child, if he or she doesn’t want to go to bed, putting on pajamas might signal the upcoming bedtime, which is something they probably want to avoid. For the child, the task is NOT MOTIVATING. This is where using reinforcement (or a reward) comes in.
Rewards can come in many forms. Some children thrive on praise or social rewards alone, such as smiles or hugs from a parent. Some children need a little more than this to be successful. Other types of rewards can include tangible items (something the child can hold or use, like a toy), edibles, stickers, or tokens (things that represent a reward that get traded in at a later time for a prize or something special).
We also need to remember that rewards need to match the difficulty level of the task. If we ask a child to do something SUPER HARD and offer them only a smile in return, this might not be enough. Along with this, if a task is simple, we don’t need to go overboard with a huge reward. So, for the pajama example, we talked and determined that books are very rewarding to my niece, and the extra bonus is that reading books is the next step in their bedtime routine, so we planned to use time with books as the motivator to getting dressed in the pajamas.
The concept of a reward should always first be presented to the child as “If you do X, you get Y,” or “First X, then Y.” NOT “If you don’t do X, you aren’t getting Y.” This stresses a more positive approach. Even the opportunity for a social reward can be presented this way. “If you finish picking up all your toys I will be so proud of you!” sounds much nicer than “If you don’t pick up these toys I won’t be proud of you.” Research in the field shows that a positive approach to behavior is a much more successful option also!
Another thing we also want to consider is the child’s ability to complete the task. If a task is too hard and they are physically or cognitively not able to complete the task independently, we want to offer support to complete the task as they are learning the skill. I will go into more detail on this in a later lesson about prompting, but generally, just keep in mind what your child can and can’t do when choosing goals. For this example, we know that my niece is physically able to put on her jammies, she just doesn’t want to do it. This would be a different goal if she physically needed prompting to complete the task. In that case, the goal might be for her to “allow prompting from mom to get dressed” to earn the books, or to “make a choice between two sets of pajamas by pointing to one,” and so on.
So, to review our steps from above, I will outline this particular behavior and use of reward:
Step 1: Task: Putting on pajamas
Step 2: Time: Before Bedtime when mom says to put on pajamas
Step 3: Reward: Reading 3 Books
Step 4: Plan for Delivery: As soon as she puts on the pajamas, she gets to pick the three books she wants and mom will read them
Step 5: Plan for Communication: Mom will tell her at bedtime “First put on your pajamas, then you get to pick three books to read with mommy!”
Step 6: Plan for what to do if the child won’t/can’t do the task: If the pajamas don’t get put on independently, the options for books would be removed. (For this particular example, the books would not get delivered if she didn’t put the pajamas on.)
NOTE: Be READY when you give your task. Make sure you have the materials needed to complete the task and make sure the reward your child is going to earn is available and that you are prepared to give it if they earn it. Do not promise the dinosaur book if you have no idea where it is! It will backfire every time.
It is very important to remember that if an expectation is set for a child to earn something for completing a task, they need to earn it if they complete the task and not earn it if they don’t complete the task. This concept is very different than removing a reward which has already been earned which we will discuss in later lessons but generally want to avoid. We need to be consistent with what we offer and deliver. This helps build trust and supports your child in learning to take you seriously as a parent.
Over time, it would be our goal as parents to reduce the needs for rewards, but rewards are a naturally occurring part of life and there is nothing wrong with using a little extra motivation to encourage a child to complete a task!
The next time you have a goal for your child that is a bit challenging, think about the steps above and try to set up a little plan for rewarding your child to complete the task. Make sure to pick a goal that is reasonably achievable and be ready with your reward. Oh, and by the way, this strategy could easily work on spouses too. The principles of reinforcement work on anyone, so the sky’s the limit.