Stars!!

So we needed a reward system in this house for a couple of different reasons…

1.  Noby now seems to think that hitting and spitting is the answer to not getting what he wants.

2.  I’m tired of having to repeat myself, over and over and over again!  Like for example, “Noby get your shoes.  Get your shoes Noby.  Noby if you want to leave you have to get your shoes…”

3.  Also, Noby is still not telling us when he has to go potty.  He isn’t having accidents however I have to remember to put him on the potty.

4.  Noby is OBSESSED with the computer.  He could play it all day long if allowed.  If Ichiro or I leave our laptops open, we always find Noby trying to play with it.  Remind me to tell you about all the pictures we found of Noby on our Photo Booth program.

Anyway I decided that we needed some type of award system.  I thought we could combine Noby’s love of the computer with rewards for acting appropriately.   We headed to Micheal’s to see what we could come up with.  I let Noby pick out some foam stars and I grabbed some velcro.  Noby could earn stars for helping out, picking up his toys, telling me he has to go potty, for doing things the first time he was told.  Then he could trade in the stars for a set amount of time on the computer.  For example I decided that Noby would earn 10 minutes of computer time for every star he earned.

We started this rewards system last week and I can’t say enough about it.  It really seems to be working.  I’m not saying that I have the perfectly behaved child however I’m repeating myself less, he’s punching a little less and we now have a nice way to cap the amount of time on the computer.  He knows when the timer goes off it’s time to shut the computer, no questions asked.  If he had only earned 1 star, he only gets 10 minutes.  Also Noby is now learning how to count by 10s, as he trades his stars in for the computer time I have him count by 10 for each star.