Rewards and threats

A wonderful way to help kids learn is with rewards for good and threats for bad. This are only good tactic is they are user appropriately.

Rewards- let's go off of the example of eating. "if you eat all of your peas you can have a cookie." yes it is a bribe, some would say bribes are bad. I am not one of those people. However, it should be done correctly. If you tell them they will get a cookie for eating all of their peas, then they should eat ALL of their peas to get the cookie. If they start to whine or throw food or if they do not eat all o their peas, they DO NOT get the cookie. It is a simple mistake a lot of parents make. They think I want them to really do X. But if you are saying they have to do something to get a reward and they don't follow through they should not get it. Otherwise the next time you try this tactic it will not work. Stick to your word. DO NOT GIVE IN. It will teach them to push your buttons to get what they want.

Threats- another very useful way to get children to behave accordingly. Like rewards it only works as good as your ability to follow through. Let's us this example "if you don't stop hitting the wall with that toy I'm going to take it away." they WILL test you! If you say it, DO IT. if they test by just tapping the wall. Take it away. This will let them know you mean what you say. If you say you're going to take it away 100 times their going to keep up what ever bad behavior they're doing. Follow through. If they have a temper tantrum because you did follow through simple respond with the truth " I told you if you kept hitting the wall I was going to take it away." if they keep up tantrum ignore them.

Rewards and threats can be useful BUT they are only effective if you follow through with what you are saying.