Do you bargain?

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If you are good this week or in the 8 year olds case don't whine about doing your HW we'll go to get ice cream on Friday. We did go and it was ok. I was curious other parents view on this bargaining thing what do you guys think?

Yep! Rewards systems do work.

Also in the negative, e.g. if you hit me with that toy, I will take it away. (one of our pretty hard and fast rules)

It depends on the issue. Some things are hard-and-fast rules and there is no bargaining, for example politeness, hygiene, and school work. Other things I am willing to bargain on, like staying up an extra 15 or 30 minutes on a weekend evening to finish reading a chapter, a couple extra cookies for dessert, etc. You have to pick your battles.

Ice cream is my biggest bargaining tool! I believe in rewards for good behavior------

NEW bargain! Circus on Sunday!! For good behavior in school and doing HW when getting home (no crying over it) I HATE the circus so I don't want to attend but I hope the girls are good and get to go.

I don't call it bargaining, but ...yup, we do it! I am more like, we all get paid in one way or another for our work. I go to my job and do it well, I get a paycheck. Their jobs are school (incl HW), and a couple of chores. If they do those things they get their pay, which is priveleges. I am pretty all or nothing, they either have priveleges or they don't.

If they do something above and beyond what is either expected or thier current skill set, then they will get something special. Example, Thursday DS started having a meltdown at school, but he was able to stay at school and he wasn't destructive. So, I took him and a neighbor out for ice cream. Another example, He accepted his brother as babysitter for the whole summer with no violence, so I took him to a WWE wrestling event. (and got front row tix!)

Occasionally I will actually bargain, which would be to negotiate a solution or compromise, which I think of differently.

We have way more success with carrot than stick with my son. "Potty treats" worked great when he was toilet learning. Working towards a toy he really wanted got him into doing his chores. The main thing I noticed was to leave it open ended, if that's the phrase I mean. For example, we once did a magnet board where he got a magnet for every desired behavior in a day, which would equal a toy when he filled it up. But he was too upset when he didn't manage to get every singe one filled, so we gave that up.

I have heard from a number of parents/teachers that it's good to phase out the rewards over time, and we have found that that happens pretty naturally with him. He gave up the potty treats without much fuss and just started doing his chores without reward without us even needing to do anything.

No, I don't bargain. I never have with either of my children. I don't believe in it. I do believe in positive reinforcement but not in the way of material things. I don't have any opinion either way on other parents doing it. In my own case it would not work anyway.

I believe bargaining is great. We do it as adults with other adults, just don't teach them to bargain too good

Rewards are great. But I hate bargaining. I prefer steady rules. I try to limit the scope of the rules so that they don't become too punitive and they leave room for generosity and love.

It's nice to be able to say: "I'm giving you a present because I love you and I will love you no matter what happens" rather than "I'm giving you a present because you have 20 gold stars." I think that if kids feel loved then then gold stars come more easily anyway.

I have a reward system for my son. I guess it is bargaining.

He is almost completely trained to use the toilet to urinate. He used to still have an accident once in a while. I made a system where he "earns" 20 minutes of computer time for each day that he keeps his pants dry. Also, if he keeps his pants dry for a whole week (Sunday to Saturday) he gets a 'bubble tea" (which is sort of a fruit slush) on Sunday.

My son is five and this system has been good as 1) he is keeping his pants dry; 2) I am limiting his computer time to acceptable levels for a child his age; 3) I am limiting his intake of calorie laden slush; and 4) he is also better learning the days of the week.

I have a picture chart I made using Boardmaker (PECS symbols) to remind him of our "bargain."

In this particular case - it has worked really well.

Also, when using "bargaining" in a more general sense, I am careful of how I phrase things. Let's say that playing with the water hose in the front yard is a motivator for him. I want him to do a less preferred activity. I say, "First we do (insert less preferred activity), then we play with the hose." I don't say, "If you do your chores, I'll let you play with the hose." or even worse, "No hose unless you do your chores." I try to keep all the requests in positive language. He always responds better this way.

I bargain with prices (although I never used to, I always thought people had prices set in stone). I do bargain with other small things as well.

We negotiate as a team in our house instead of doing rewards. My son was having troubles getting all that he needed to get done as part of the family before playing Spore (his current obsession) so we worked on a system that would "show" him he'd completed all his tasks and he was free to do what he wanted to do. Ours are simple glass aquarium decorations on top of a jar with a sticky note on the outside that shows his five things to do. When he gets the five things done (the last one is 'ask mum if there is anything else that needs to be done'), he is free to do his thing.

I worry about reward systems because in real life we don't often get rewarded for doing the right thing, we're just supposed to do it without expecting reward. My son takes everything quite literally still and tends to translate what happens at home into the world outside our doors. I worry (for mine personally), that if we started some kind of reward it would become an expectation rather than just doing what you are supposed to do because that's what you are supposed to do. I kind of screwed this up by offering a treat after eating healthy food. For the longest time his expectation was "I get a treat every time I eat something healthy" which translated in his brain to having lollies after every meal including breakfast and snacks.