should teachers give rewards to students for good behavior
TRANSCRIPT
Should Teachers Give Rewards to Students for Good Behavior? A Psycho-
Educational Perspective
by: Carmen Y. Reyes
Word Count: 1299
Date: Fri, 4 Mar 2011 Time: 9:43 AM
Rewarding students for good behavior is a popular classroom discipline
procedure. Teachers of habitually disruptive students like using rewards
because, in a well-structured reward system, they have the potential of winning
students’ compliance fast. Advocates of using rewards to discipline students with
habitually disruptive behaviors claim that rewards promote compliance and stop
misbehavior. Opponents of rewards state that rewarding students, an externally
oriented procedure (the teacher regularly administers the rewards, not the
student) are a way of controlling and manipulating children’s behavior that does
little to change permanently the disruptive behavior. In other words, the short-
term effect of stopping misbehavior does not translate into a long-term effect of
helping children grow and develop better-adjusted ways of behaving. Alfie Kohn,
the author of Punished by Rewards states that rewards can be seen as
punishment in the sense that rewards both manipulate behavior and are a form
of doing things to students rather than with students. Both advocates and
opponents of rewards present strong supportive arguments and I would like to
bring a psycho-educational perspective to this controversy.
Assuming that the teacher has a well-structured and consistent reward
system, rewarding students with habitually, and in some cases severe, disruptive
behaviors can be a fast and effective way of winning compliance. My fourteen
years of experience teaching emotionally disturbed/behaviorally disordered
students strongly supports the conclusion that rewards are fast and effective.
Nevertheless, I also understand that, if used alone and with no clear long-term
goals (both for the student and for the teacher) in place, rewards are short-lived.
External rewards may temporarily inhibit disruptive behaviors but they do not
teach appropriate behavior and will not help children outgrow the disruptive
behavior. Teachers need to be aware that rewards appeal exclusively to
students’ extrinsic motivation (“I do _____ so that I can get _____”) having little
or no effect in strengthening children’s intrinsic motivation (i.e. self-pride, self-
confidence, self-efficacy, and a sense of accomplishment among
others). Consequently, even when the teacher uses rewards consistently, a
discipline system that only takes into consideration giving rewards while ignoring
children’s perceptions, attitudes, and feelings may have a strong short-term
effect in winning compliance, but no long-term effect in helping habitually
disruptive students learn new and more productive ways of behaving. Simply put,
psycho-educational teachers see rewards as one way of supporting and
strengthening the more comprehensive psycho-educational program, but they
never use rewards as the only and/or most important component in the
behavioral management program. Primarily, teaching self-management of
behavior is the long-term psycho-educational goal; rewarding behavior
extrinsically while the student develops internal self-control and is able to self-
manage behavior is just a supportive tool in our more comprehensive psycho-
educational toolbox.
This brings us to the second point that I would like to make. At all stages of the
reward program, students should be part of the decision-making process.
Children have a say in what is motivating to them, and they have a choice in the
kinds of rewards included. Even when we are externally manipulating the
behavior, we give choices to children and make children part of the decision-
making process, encouraging and inviting the child in formulating solutions.
Learning to make better-adjusted behavioral choices is another long-term goal
that we teach children since the beginning. Children learn to make good
behavioral choices by having the opportunity to choose, not by following our
directions or receiving rewards. For this reason, we explain to the child that once
he or she is better equipped to self-manage behavior, we will fade the extrinsic
reward system, moving the student gradually from an externally supported
system into an almost exclusively internally motivated support system. The
child’s self-management skills and self-awareness tell us when he is ready to
make the transition. In addition, just knowing that they now require less external
manipulation than at the earlier stages of intervention is extremely rewarding and
motivating to students. Teachers can measure success when we find ourselves
using considerable fewer rewards at the final stages of our intervention program
than the amount of extrinsically motivated rewards required at the initial stages of
our intervention.
If you are thinking of implementing a reward system to manage a habitually
disruptive student, or already have one, the following guidelines will be helpful in
increasing the system’s efficiency. With minimal variations, you can adjust these
guidelines so that you can use them with a disruptive class.
Get to know the child as an individual. Find out what the child is
interested about and what motivates him or her; also, find out what the
child dislikes. Directly ask the child what is reinforcing to him or her. You
and the child should discuss the reinforcement.
After discussing what is rewarding to the child, set goals with him, and
help the child translate the goal into an action plan that clearly lists the
sub-steps that he will need to follow to reach the goal. Link the reward
system with the action plan, aiming at reinforcing the action plan.
To set goals and develop an action plan, engage the student in a
discussion about “the ways he wants to be (goal),” and how he can make
that happen (action plan).
Do not assume that the student knows how to listen, how to cooperate
with other students, or how to solve social problems. Teachers need to
teach those behaviors explicitly.Explain to the student, model, and
then review the behavior that you expect from the child. Give the student
examples of alternative behaviors that the child can use to replace the
habitually disruptive behaviors. The extra time you spend earlier in the
year teaching socially appropriate behaviors to habitually disruptive
students will save you time and frustration in the future.
Explicitly state what the student needs to do to earn the reward. For
example, just saying, “Be nice to each other” or “Pay attention to the
lesson” is not enough. You need to state what the child is going to do in
behavioral terms, for example, “15 minutes seated and doing your class
work will earn you a token.” The link between the child’s behavior and the
reinforcement must be apparent to the child.
Vary the reinforcement, so that the child does not get used to it, and does
not feel bored by the same reward. With the student, you can develop
a reinforcement menu (10-15 rewards), and to make it more appealing,
include a mystery reward. When the child meets her behavior expectation,
she selects one reward from the reinforcement menu.
For bigger rewards, you can use a token system, so that each day, the
child earns tokens, points, or checks that she exchanges at the end of the
week or month.
Emphasize social and privilege reinforcement (e.g. breakfast with the
teacher or extra computer time) over material reinforcement (toy and
prizes). Reinforcement that involves spending time with adults and doing
tasks together are generally more rewarding to children than toys.
Remember, when you spend time with the child, resist the temptation to
discipline the child during that time. In other words, keep reinforcement
time and discipline time clearly separated.
Always keep in mind that, particularly for students with recurrent behavior
problems, for behavior to be good does not need to be perfect.
Reward effort and improvement; that is, notice and appreciate that the
child is trying hard and is doing a little better each time.
Teach the student self-rewards and self-reinforcement; for example, the
child compliments herself for raising her hand, for waiting her turn, for
using a learning strategy, or for thinking of a better approach to solve a
situation. Gradually transition the student from an externally manipulated
reward system to self-reward and self-reinforcement.