Are you looking for a way to encourage good behavior by your kids? Try reward coupons for kids!
After Christmas is over, sometimes it’s hard to get everyone back to normal life and normal behavior. Especially little kids. In December, you might have been able to use the threat of Santa Claus or the Elf on the Shelf to keep your kids listening. In January, that threat is gone. So, for the rest of the year, how can you reinforce good behavior?
My Best Behavior Hack
I have found that rewards for good behavior are way more effective than punishments for bad behavior. When I punish for an unfortunate choice, especially if it’s delayed punishment, the benefit lasts for approximately 30 seconds. A reward, on the other hand, can last for months. Especially if the reward opportunity is ongoing.
When my son started Kindergarten, he was having a hard time waiting to be called on to talk to the teacher. I was getting my fair share of emails from the teacher about needing to work with my son on this skill at home. We instituted a reward system for good behavior at school and, voila! His classroom behavior improved by leaps and bounds!
Now, you can institute a reward system for good behavior in whichever way works for you. If you’d like to keep it simple, pick one reward and use it for everything. Stickers tend to work well for littles and food gives you the best bang for your buck with bigger kids. In my experience, anyway.
Coupons = Fun
If you want to increase the fun factor in your reward system, reward coupons for kids are a great way to go. All you do is think up a variety of fun treats that your kid can “cash in” when he has earned them. Don’t worry, this doesn’t have to be a craft project. I have a sheet of paper on my desk that says “Reward Coupons for Kids” at the top and contains a list of special treats. You can make them single-use or multi-use. We chose the multi-use option because my son’s reward of choice is almost always the same.
If you’re tired of punishing your kids and seeing no change, and reward coupons for kids sounds intriguing to you, I’ve got a whole bunch of coupon ideas to get you started. The list below includes treats that my kids enjoy, but please tailor your reward coupons to your kids. If you give them the opportunity to earn treats or experiences they really want, you’ll have a better chance at seeing those behaviors improve!
Reward Coupons for Kids
Experiences
The reward coupons for kids that get redeemed in my house most often are the experience-related options. These can run the gamut, so get creative!
Out to dinner
The most redeemed reward coupons for kids in my house all revolve around going out to dinner. My kids both love to go out to dinner, but we don’t do it very often. That means the opportunity to have a meal out is a special treat worth modifying their behavior for.
If your kid prefers to go out to breakfast or lunch at a restaurant works better with your schedule, feel free to tailor this experience coupon to your specific needs.
Late bedtime
This is another reward that really excites my son. He gets super jazzed any time he’s able to stay up later than his sister. If you have multiple kids who usually go to bed around the same time, you might want to give this one a try too. This coupon is almost a double reward – stay up late and get solo time with a parent. What kid doesn’t want both of those things?
Fort
My kids have been into building forts in the family room lately. Me? Not so much. Mom is not a huge fan of the state of my family room after the fort is built. My kids are still too young to put the room back how they found it after they’ve finished playing in their fort, so the clean-up largely falls on my shoulders. But, because I don’t let my kids make a fort out of the couch cushions on any old day, that makes building a fort a great experience to add to my list of reward coupons for kids. Heck, I even help them build it, play in the fort, and clean up the mess when they choose this as their reward!
Golf
If your kid isn’t obsessed with sports like mine is, this might not be the reward for you. But if your kid does eat, sleep, and breathe sports, add a golf-related activity to your list of reward coupons for kids!
You can add separate coupons for putt-putt golf and the driving range to their reward options or you can just have a golf coupon that lets your kid decide what to do. Older kids might even be able to choose 9 holes of golf. If your kid has been really good and you have a Top Golf near you, this activity can two rewards in one – golf and food!
Is your kid sports-obsessed, but isn’t really into golf? Substitute these golf-related activities for other sports-related fun. Extra ice time if hockey is your kid’s preferred sport, a trip to the batting cages if it’s baseball, or time at the park shooting hoops if basketball tops the list.
Grocery store
I try my hardest to go to the grocery store solo. It’s just the quickest way for me to get in, get out, and get on with life. When I’m not able to go solo, I usually have both kids with me, which usually devolves into fighting and threats. A trip the grocery store with just one kid would be a real treat, both for the kid who earns it and for mom!
A solo grocery store trip with mom doesn’t just give the kid a bit of one-on-one time, it also gives the kid the opportunity to choose some items at the store. Should the family eat grapes or oranges this week? The kid with the good behavior gets to choose!
PJ day
I am not a stay in PJs all day type of person. I get up and dressed, even just to stay at home all day. This doesn’t mean I wear fancy clothes or makeup, it just means that I change my clothes into something more daytime appropriate every day. Because this is how I am, I also get my kids dressed every day. So, the opportunity to stay in PJs makes a great item on my list of reward coupons for kids. It’s fun and out of the ordinary for them! And it might even come with complementary fun like breakfast for dinner!
Phone game
If you read my Small Changes for a Fresh Start post, you’ll know that I gave up my phone game this year. I have deleted it from my phone to avoid the time suck and find better mental breaks in my day. Before I deleted the game, though, it made a great reward for my kids. You see, I hardly ever let them have my phone. Not to play games or watch videos. So, handing over the phone and letting them play a game was a big deal. I’m thinking that after I am no longer conditioned to play the game when I have a free minute, I can reinstall it on my phone and only use it for kids’ rewards. They will really miss this reward in the meantime.
Treats
If your kid is more sugar-driven than fun experience-driven, your reward coupons for kids should include lots of options for yummy treats!
Ice cream
What kid doesn’t love ice cream? My kids sure love it. Their love for it and the fact that they don’t get it all that often makes it a great item to add to your list of reward coupons for kids. How you offer the ice cream reward is up to you. You can let them have ice cream instead of a meal, as an extra special treat, or even as an experience if you go out to get ice cream at your local ice cream parlor. Mom, don’t forget, you can have a hot fudge sundae too!
Soda
Another forbidden edible item in my house is soda. We don’t have it in the house, and we only let our kids have a few sips of watered-down soda on very special occasions. If you’re braver than I am, you could offer a full-strength soda as a reward option. Just do it early in the day so you get some sleep.
Snack
I’m sure you offer your kids an after-school snack every day. No matter when they last ate or what they had for lunch, they come home absolutely starving. Typical after-school snacks aren’t fun, though. They are usually nutritious, balanced, and fairly small in serving size. A fun item to add to your list of reward coupons for kids is a fun after-school snack. Think of things like pizza bagels or nachos or fast food or something insanely sugary. Snacks kids will behave for.
Stickers
Most of these ideas for reward coupons for kids have been aimed at my 6-year-old son. But this is the reward coupon that my 3-year-old daughter always chooses. She’s obsessed with stickers. She wants any sticker, anytime, anywhere. We use stickers to promote good behavior in many ways. We have sticker charts for bedtime, special stickers for good behavior at special events, and permission to put stickers anywhere when she’s had a run of consistently good behavior. This last sticker-related reward is probably her favorite. She loves to be given carte blanche to put stickers everywhere she wants. It’s low effort/cost, big reward.
Power
In my experience, kids most love fun experiences with people they love, special things to eat, and power. Although my kids more often than not choose an experience or a treat, every once in a while, it’s good to let them exercise some controlled power. Make some of your reward coupons for kids power-based to save yourself a handful of power struggles down the road.
Dinner menu
If we aren’t going out to dinner, my son loves to pick what I make for dinner at home. Honestly, I like when he picks what I make for dinner too because then I know he’ll likely eat it. Make everyone happy by having a reward coupon be choosing the dinner menu. Sure, they’ll probably pick something like chicken nuggets or pizza, but you can add a salad or some fruit on the side to make it healthy, or at least healthy-ish.
Music
I have failed as a parent. My kids don’t like my music. I choose artists like The Beatles and Fleetwood Mac, and I get yelled at for singing along. It’s a sad state of affairs. If your kids are similarly embarrassed by your music, add choosing the music in the car to your list of reward coupons for kids. Just be warned: it’s going to be the K Pop Demon Hunters soundtrack. Gonna be gonna be golden.
Right
If you have more than one kid, you are well acquainted with children fighting. Siblings bicker constantly. Seriously. It’s always something. And by the time you get involved, it’s often a he-said she-said and you have no idea what the truth really is. So, one idea of a reward for good behavior is to let your kid who earned it be right in a fight with his or her sibling. It might sound a little unorthodox, but if your kids know that winning a spat among siblings is at stake, they might just surprise you with how well-behaved they can be.
Get out of jail free card
You probably just read that and froze. Too much power, Sara, you’re saying. Well, maybe. You can reward your child’s good behavior with a get out of jail free card, but it’s still your discretion to accept it or not. You get to lay the ground rules for when they can use it. In my house, it can’t be used when someone is physically hurt, for example. But to get dessert when the kid didn’t eat his vegetables? Sure!
Other posts
Looking for more creative parenting approaches? I’ve tried to help in the following posts:
So, have I convinced you to adopt reward coupons for kids to encourage good behavior? What other reward coupons would you add to your list? We could all use ideas, so please share below or over on Instagram @sarainseason.