Motivation

I wanted quiet children, but instead our house is full of noise. There is a lot of singing, humming, and laughing and talking. There is a lot of noise made simply for the sake of making noise. There is a lot of yelling, and a lot of it is happy. The boys yell when they win, when they lose, when they are excited, when they are doing things they aren't supposed to do, when they are doing things they are supposed to do, when they are in the bath, when they are at the dinner table, when I am in the shower, when they are playing cars, when they are laying on the couch, when they are looking for cookies. Some days it is just one big stereo set to static in here.

Sometimes I yell. Sometimes it is to be heard over the din. Other times it is because yelling is better than clobbering. Mostly it is because they do not do anything I ask them to do until I ask them to do it 30 times in a nice voice, and then scream it from the top of my lungs 4 times after that.

One day last week I had had enough. I dropped them off at school, drove to the bank and got $2 in pennies. I went home and cleaned out two plastic yogurt containers, cut up a bunch of colored paper for the boys to stick on to the containers, cut slits in the tops of the containers, and waited. When school was out I picked up the boys and directed them to their art projects.

Now the boys earn a penny every time they do something the first time I ask. They also earn a penny if they play nicely while I am in the shower, and they earn another one if they stay at the table during dinner. Tomorrow morning they will earn two if they stay in bed all night. It doesn't work every time, but it works pretty well.



I'm just glad I had the sense to start with pennies this time. Last time I used money as a motivator I promised them dollars and I ended up paying each of them nine bucks!