I would like to KISS ON THE LIPS whichever commenter mentioned the plan of making children earn video game minutes with reading. …Wait, I’d give a kiss on the lips but I won’t take a few seconds to look up who it was? Hang on, BRB. Okay, so on the post where I asked for input on how much time children should be allowed to play video games, it was in fact SEVERAL commenters who get kisses on the lips (cash substitution available) (kisses have no cash value): Sara Hammond, my friend Mairzy, Andrea Unplugged, js, Donna, and Beyond ALL mentioned the concept of letting kids EARN video game time.
Looking through to find which commenters those were, I was reminded of how GOOD that comments section was (really, go look if you haven’t already—a great assortment of viewpoints). It showed me what I thought about video games, as I found myself identifying with certain comments. It turns out I’m on the side of not setting a particular number of minutes (for one thing because my kids, like some commenters’ kids, would then make SURE they played ALL the minutes, rather than some days playing less or none), and on the side of basing daily video game decisions on what else has been done that day, and whether video game playing seems to be leading to poor-quality moods, and whether we have a brand new game to play, and what type of game is being played, and so forth.
Several commenters also pointed out a problem I’d noticed but hadn’t NOTICED-noticed, which is that the trouble with a lot of kids is that if one kid is playing and the others are watching that kid play, then having a certain number of minutes doesn’t really work: even if each kid were allowed 30 minutes, they could theoretically watch another TWO HOURS of someone else’s video game time. This is a problem with TV time, too, as you might imagine.
ANYWAY, I was most inspired by the concept of letting kids BUY video game time. I was worried this might lead to increased playing (because they’d have EARNED the right to play, rather than it being up to my whim), or to them feeling like books = chores, or SOMETHING, so I broached the idea tentatively to the two older kids for discussion. They were RIVETED by the idea, and we talked for a long time about what would count toward earning minutes, and also I said I would change the rules if things weren’t working out.
Here are the things they can do to earn minutes: read, write (journal or creative), do workbook pages, do Sudoku or crossword puzzles. It’s one minute of those things to buy one minute of video games, and they don’t start with any free minutes.
Well, and then the twins wanted in on it too. So here’s what they can do to earn minutes: read, practice writing their names/letters, do workbook pages, do flashcards. So we modified the older kids’ list: if they help a younger sibling with flashcards, they earn minutes too.
We went out and bought a timer and a package of poker chips (which we call “tokens”), and some workbooks and flashcards (Target has a bunch in their dollar section). We labeled disposable plastic cups with the kids’ names (except Henry, who is too young for this), and we made a code for poker chip colors: blue is 10 minutes, green is 30 minutes, etc. When they do a token-earning activity, they put a token in their cup; when they play a video game, they pay a token first, then set a timer for the number of minutes of the token. (They can do computer research for free, assuming it doesn’t get out of hand.)
We left some things undecided for now, such as what if two kids both have tokens and both want to play, how long can one kid play before having to give the other kid a turn? And I’m hoping no one will notice that when one kid spends a token, the other kids can watch without having to spend tokens. We’ll see if those issues come up or not.
And do you know what all this has led to, at least this first week? TOKEN HOARDING. Almost ZERO video-game playing, and LOTS of token-earning. COMPETITIVE token-earning. Children saying things such as, “Hey, how many tokens do you have? WHAT!! I’m going to go read RIGHT NOW.” Children saying things such as, “I’m tempted to spend a token—but I’m not sure it would be worth it.” Children saying things such as, “Wow, half an hour goes by a lot faster than I thought!” We have AWARENESS OF VIDEO GAME TIME FLOW developing! We have AWARENESS OF SPENDING PRIORITIES developing! PARDON MY ENTHUSIASTIC USE OF CAPITAL LETTERS.
And–AND–now we have an EXCELLENT punishment: we can TAKE AWAY TOKENS. We don’t have any system set up for that yet, but if something comes up later I can say, “From now on, whenever you do that, you lose a 10-minute token.” This is easier than saying, “That’s it, no more video games today!” which, first of all, punishes ME too, and secondly can lead to the child saying, “Fine, I didn’t want to play any more games ANYWAY!” and then I’d have to bang my head against the wall for awhile, so really this is to everyone’s benefit. This lets me take away video game time from whenever they WOULD have wanted to play it, nyah nyah.
Ohh – the ability to take away a token – very concrete punishment – something they can see visually. I also really like the idea that the older kids can earn points by helping the younger kids learn. That’s really neat and hopefully creates a supportive environment – ie maybe at some point one older-younger pair can compete against the other older-younger pair – works well if there’s a specific video game they want to play that the others don’t I’m guessing.
I like this idea… I’m glad it’s working so far.
We’re still only in the Leapster stage but this is a wonderful idea.
Awesome idea!! Finn is still too little, but I can see this working for lots of parents.
Oh, I learn SO MUCH from you. THIS is why YOU have kids BEFORE me. Thank you! Must remember this.
This is BRILLIANT. Good job, collective community of blogger and blog-readers/commenters! We are so smart, us togther!
LOVE this.
THAT IS SO AWESOME. Genius.
BRILLIANT!
ooh, I LIKE the idea of losing tokens as punishment! We’ve been taking away toy cars/spiderman figurines with Eli, but whenever we do it he’s all, “ok” and shrugs and finds something else to play with. So far a big fail. But I kind of think he’s too young; with Addy taking away toys works pretty well. I can only imagine this gets more impactful as kids get older?
I especially love that Sudoku, crosswords and other activities count as well. What a wonderful way to expand their interests. They may find that they enjoy word games more than video games. Have you tried Logic Puzzles? This might be more suited toward your oldest only, but they give a brief paragraph setting up a story with clues, and then you have to infer who did what at what time and on what day by filling in a graph. Okay, my explanation is kind of convoluted but if you google it, you should see an example. My math teacher introduced them to me at 13 and 15 years later I’m still addicted to them :)
yay! a kiss on the lips from swistle! credit goes to my admirable in-laws of course. (and i love your token idea!)
This sounds fantastic Swiz. Please keep us updating on how it continues to work for your family.
This sounds like a great syren. But I have a question/scenario.
What happens when the child dawdles or procrastinates while doing workbooks, etc. just to earn more time. I have a kid who dawdles now, and there’s no reward. So, just curious how you would handle that.
Swiggy- That was another of the things I told them we’d put off deciding on until it became an issue. I told them there’d be a general time limit for now—like, they can’t bring me a worksheet to check (the answers also have to be right) and say “It took me an hour!” I hope it DOESN’T get to be an issue (and it probably will, because I have a dawdler), because I’m not sure what to do about that. If I say “This worksheet is worth 15 minutes,” maybe?
Yay! That sounds like a workable system. And it’s cool, too, with all the tokens and cups.
The general rule in our house is that no matter how much computer time you have saved up, you can play only twenty minutes at a time. And once all three computer-players have taken turns, there’s no more computer-playing until after a logical division, such as lunch time or after Quiet Play.
Also, it would probably help your mental health to assign times to a worksheet beforehand. You can always be flexible when it comes to actually rewarding the time.
I’m glad the kids are responding so well. It’s amazing what a little bribery can do. :)
Genius. Pure genius. I need to bookmark this…
Oh I am going to have to remember this one a few years from now. Super great system Swistle!
I am DEFINITELY filing this post for future reference!
Awesome. I love this.
So clever! Do the tokens roll over or do the kids lose them at the end of the day/week/month/whatever?
Oooh you’ve got a great system worked up there! It sounds fantastic.
I love setting these things up but they fail in my house because I, yes I, have horrible follow through. I’m my own worst enemy.
I’d love to continue to hear how this is going.
Click. Sending this in a email to husband.
Thanks to all of your commenters, and your genius tokens idea!
Francesca- For now, they roll over: I was worried otherwise they’d force themselves to spend them even if they didn’t want to, or that they’d carefully earn only what they wanted to spend. But…..I’m a little worried about this!
Maddie’s still playing Leapster, but once she (and Sam) start playing the Wii, I’m totally stealing this idea. I’m fairly certain it’s the best idea in the history of parenting. Score yet another home run for Swistle.
What would I do without you?
This is brilliant! Maybe I’ll use this methodology to get my (3 yo) son to start using the potty. Use the potty, earn one Spongebob story (not a half-hour episode, a STORY). No potty use, no Spongebob.
Lord, I can already hear the screams.
Ooh…. this is fantastic.
I’m totally looking for video game tokens and cups now (didn’t read the earlier comment section, so I missed the comment.
And this starts my 5-year-old on some adding and math comments, just for score-keeping.
I don’t even HAVE children and I’m beside myself with how great this system is. Bravo, Swis!
I wish to high heaven this would work with my kid. I would pee my pants with excitement if he started hoarding tokens and dashing off to earn! more! tokens!
Alas, I think he would sneer at me for my attempt to motivate him.
Want to trade kids?
You know what I think is the best part of this plan? That you sat down together to come up with a system – the kids are more invested when it’s their idea.
Actually, I think the roll-over is fine. I think most addiction is cumulative — the more regularly you do it, the more you crave it. So if two weeks of little or no game-playing is followed by a day-long binge, it’s either (1) not the end of the world or (2) an occasion for a kid to discover they actually get sick of game-playing after X hours or (3) a chance to tweak your rules. Best case scenario, they put it off for so long they gradually lose interest — this is how TV works for me.
For not having kids, it’s nice to know my ideas aren’t completely ridiculous! I am glad you found a hybrid kind of system that works for y’all and hopefully you won’t even have to address some of those “what ifs”.
I just wanted to add another idea. I use a very similar reward system in my classroom – earn tokens/points for good behavior/helping someone else/caught being nice, spend points on a drawing for prizes (usually school supplies).
How about giving the kids options to choose something other than video games to spend their points on? It could be anything really – a trip to the park, ice cream, a movie, etc. You assign a point value to the treat and they can choose to use each point for a minute of video game or they can save up for something “special”. Just an idea to help them from saving up hours for video games and wanting to use them all at once.
this has to do with your tweet about milk.
we have three adults and two toddlers and a baby in the house this summer (my sister’s staying with us), plus i’m nursing (new baby! yea!). we drink nearly a gallon a day. sometimes nearly a gallon just at dinner. is this abnormal?
ok now the videogaming: LOVE this idea!! my oldest spends so much time playing. i’ve been feeling like it’s getting out of hand. i’m so glad to have these ideas!
Anon- I’m not sure! We do go through a lot more milk when I’m pregnant/nursing, or when I’m making fudge/smoothies/mac-‘n’-cheese more often. And my two older children dislike milk, so one of them drinks none and the other drinks the half a cup a day I make him drink, and I don’t think Paul drinks ANY milk. The three littles like it, but the pediatrician suggested they not have more than 1-2 cups a day, so that’s what they get: one cup at breakfast and one cup at dinner, with water to drink if they finish that. And I drink milk too—probably 1-2 cups a day. We’re probably a little below average for our family size: I’m always seeing those “big family” articles where a family with 7 children will say they drink 80 gallons of milk a week or whatevs.
Brilliant, just brilliant!
80 gallons of milk a week ha ha haaa! i know what you mean. i hadn’t even thought about asking how much milk they should/shouldn’t be drinking. huh. are yours juice/kool-aid/whatever else drinkers too or mostly just milk and water? maybe we go through so much because that’s mostly all we have? hmmm.
KK- They can also have one cup of orange juice per day. So it’s two cups of milk, one cup of orange juice, and the rest water.
I haven’t read the comments yet, but I was going to ask how Henry is taking this? My three year old would NOT accept the idea that he is too young and would be wanting to do it too.
Daycare Girl- He is indeed a little cheesed. But it helps that he doesn’t really understand the system, either. So when the twins are reading, he sits with them and “reads” too. And I got some ABC flashcards that the older kids can earn tokens for doing with him—even though he doesn’t earn tokens for it himself. And I got him some pre-K workbooks so he can do workbooks when the twins do workbooks. He’s a little cheesed, still, though, because he doesn’t get a TOKEN CUP!
LOVE this idea. LOVE it.
The beautiful thing I think is that you can apply it to any behavior you want to reinforce/want to limit around the house.
I know that for my daughter (4) that the sticker chart has worked wonders for getting her to stop fighting me about brushing her teeth and doing her hair, and I feel like your technique is a direct extension of that kind of discipline. I really love it!
I’m glad you found something that is working well for you guys – that, above all else, is the key – that it works for you!
This is genius. I’m ripping it off as we speak.
This. is. BRILLIANT. Did it end up working out? (No need to reply if there’s a follow-up post I haven’t read yet. I’ll get there eventually.)
I can’t remember if I ever followed up on this one or not. It worked beautifully in the short run, but tanked in the long run. One issue was the same as if I’d assigned minutes: they felt like they HAD to play as many video game minutes as they’d earned. Another issue was cheating and/or REPORTED cheating: i.e., a child claiming another child hadn’t legitimately earned the tokens and/or had taken someone else’s tokens. Another issue was one child earning tons and spending almost none, so that we ran out of tokens.