reward stickers at school

Stephanie - posted on 02/20/2009

I am a kindergarten teacher and i suggest you find a time to talk directly with the teacher about your concerns. If your child is losing stickers for a reason then that reason should be explained to him so that he can change the behavior and to you so that as a parent you can address the issues. If there are no reasons given to your child then he's not learning what he needs to do differently. I would ask for a daily report to go home with your son explaining why stickers were missed. your sons teacher shouldn't get upset with you for showing concern about what is happining in your child's life while you are at work. she might not even be aware that you are concerned about the situation.

Corinna - posted on 02/20/2009

Our son's teacher started a similar reward systems where they had to give up beads if the didn't speak french. (That was in a french immersion school) At the end of the week everybody's beads were counted and the kids got rewards if they still had any left.
The only problem with this reward system was that all the kids were supposed to remind each other and were able to tell somebody to give up a bead if they caught each other. Our son is very honest and every time he was caught he gave up a bead. Most other kids weren't that honest and the teacher kind of new about it but never did anything. (She even told us so in a conversation)So at the end of the week our son had no more beads left and he was devastated. It got so bad that he did not want to go to school anymore. He felt like a failure and this was only Grade 1. We talked to the teachers about it and they changed the system. But the damage was done and our son started to have anxiety issues that grew worse from week to week. We finally took him out of school and are homeschooling now.
So to make a long story short, yes you need to talk to the teachers. We have seen so many things that we are not agreeing with in public schools over the years. And as parents we need to take a stand and show our children that we are there for them.

Ellen - posted on 02/19/2009

Crystal I agree that you need to identify the specific behavior and go from there. This year in 1st grade we set up a chart with the teacher. No more than 3 redirects every 15 minutes for blurting out. After he had mastered that for a period of 4-6 weeks we reduced to 2 redirects then 1. Today the teacher said they agreed no more chart unless the behavior comes back.

Last years teacher was appalled that we were supporting (rewards consequences based on folder) the behavior stuff at home and was purposely hiding things from us until the report card. She thought she was helping, but really individualization is the key to success for a student. My child needed reinforcement at home to know he wasn't gettting away with anything.

Crystal - posted on 02/19/2009

First of all, before there can be consequences, there has to be a specific undesired behaviour! And how old is your son? It has been proven many times that especially with younger children, the consequences must take place immediately after the behaviour takes place in order to be effective. Now, if your son can come home and say he didn't get any stickers because he was hitting other kids (just for example) then I would definately enforce some consequences because he obviously knows what he did wrong. I agree with opening communication lines with the teacher. That is very important. Find out what exactly he has to do to get the stickers, and what his behaviour is that he is not getting them. It is important to teach your child to make good choices, but you have to choose an effective way of doing so. Punishing him when he doesn't know why he is being punished won't do it. I don't think you are overprotective, I think you are thinking logically. Good luck

Christine - posted on 02/19/2009

Ellen, great points.  I think this is why some children fall between the cracks.  There is always something to reward and it needs to be a individualized program, because what is easy for some isn't for others, etc.  I'm so glad you got your situation figured out. 

Ellen - posted on 02/18/2009

We met with the teacher when this was happening with Z. Then we explained that in our household there were rewards / consequences based on what she put in the daily folder. Any time she was not clear about the offense we immediately sent an e-mail asking about it. We explained that we felt she had our son a significant portion of the day and that we were basically co-parenting and she needed to keep all of us informed. Once she started doing this our son knew exacty what he did each day. Then we were able to determine that he was in the wrong educational placement and went from there. He's had a much better year this year. We also forced the issue that no child should have no successful days in a school year - it's defeating and they loose interest in school. It also becomes an unsafe place for them. Not cool!

Christine - posted on 02/18/2009

I think you need to sit down with the teacher and have a talk.  I don't think you would be coming across as overprotective, you just want to be informed on what is going on in the classroom.  You could even just suggest a meeting to see how your son is doing with things, and then mention the stickers and ask how it works and what the children have to do to get the stickers or not get them.  As far as punishment or consequences for not getting stickers go, I don't think anything should be enforced unless your child's teacher has contacted you with bad behavior.  You don't know what is going on.  Honestly, what if your child for some reason is just being overlooked?  What if his good behaviors that should be rewarded are done when the teacher is looking the other way or isn't paying attention?  What if for some reason (hope this isn't the case) the teacher is playing favorites?  There are so many questions to ask when someone else is caring for our children and we aren't around to see exactly what is going on.  Reward systems are great and can really do wonders for children's behaviors, learning, responsibilities, etc., but only if they are enforced correctly and without bias. 

I would schedule a meeting with the teacher, and ask hubby to hold off on the on the punishment.  I hope you get things straightened out soon.