Positive Reinforcement

When you are praising a behavior be sure to describe what they are doing. Ex. “Great job putting your shoes on the first time I asked.”
Sometimes calling attention to someone else’s good behavior prompts other children to behave appropriately.
Rewards are used in order to increase the child’s motivation to behave appropriately and/or to complete a non-preferred task.
Traditional motivators are not always as effective with all children. You may need to get creative!
Some examples of rewards: Verbal praise, token, snack, time with a preferred family member, preferred activity, taking a walk, being a helper, doing a special job, free time, etc.
REMEMBER the value of the reward changes from minute to minute, day by day. You will need to frequently reassess what the child is motivated by.
Time earned with rewarding item or activity should be short (30 seconds to 2 minutes). If you give too long of time period to enjoy the reward, it may lose its effectiveness and may make it more difficult to return to task.
Best practice is to reinforce immediately following a desired behavior. This is especially important when you are trying to introduce something new.
Initially reinforcement will be frequent in order for the student to understand the relationship between expected behavior (what you want them to do) and the reward.
Once the student becomes more successful in engaging in desired behavior or non-preferred activity, the frequency and immediacy of the reinforcement can systematically be reduced.

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Positive Reinforcement

When you are praising a behavior be sure to describe what they are doing. Ex. “Great job putting your shoes on the first time I asked.”

Sometimes calling attention to someone else’s good behavior prompts other children to behave appropriately.

Rewards are used in order to increase the child’s motivation to behave appropriately and/or to complete a non-preferred task.

Traditional motivators are not always as effective with all children. You may need to get creative!

Some examples of rewards: Verbal praise, token, snack, time with a preferred family member, preferred activity, taking a walk, being a helper, doing a special job, free time, etc.

REMEMBER the value of the reward changes from minute to minute, day by day. You will need to frequently reassess what the child is motivated by.

Time earned with rewarding item or activity should be short (30 seconds to 2 minutes). If you give too long of time period to enjoy the reward, it may lose its effectiveness and may make it more difficult to return to task.

Best practice is to reinforce immediately following a desired behavior. This is especially important when you are trying to introduce something new.

Initially reinforcement will be frequent in order for the student to understand the relationship between expected behavior (what you want them to do) and the reward.

Once the student becomes more successful in engaging in desired behavior or non-preferred activity, the frequency and immediacy of the reinforcement can systematically be reduced.