"Caught Ya"- Positive Reinforcement

Being a guest blogger has to be one of my favorite things to do...I really enjoy sharing my blog with others and I have found so many great blogs this way as well.

Even though I love being a guest blogger I tend to get a little anxious...I mean who doesn't get a little nervous posting something out there for people to see? On my own blog I am nervous enough...but when it's someone else's it has to be perfect! So here is to hoping my little post is perfect ;)

Today I want to share one of the behavior management pieces from my classroom. It can be used with other behavior management tools...but if you are lucky enough like I was last year it may be the only thing you need!

I'm really big on positive reinforcement and I have found that rewarding the kids that are doing what is expected often times motivates the other kids in the class to do the same. At the beginning of last year I wanted to find a visual/tactile way to reward those students to encourage the others.
My first step was creating my "Caught Ya Being Good" Jar that sits in the front of the classroom. I wanted it to be something cutesy and big enough for the kids to see as a reminder throughout the day. I got this fishbowl at Wal-Mart and the stickers at Hobby Lobby.

Then I made "Caught Ya Being Good" slips to hand out at any point during the day to reinforce the positive behavior I was seeing. (I had a parent helper cut a ton of these out at the beginning of the year!)

When a kid receives a slip they write their name on it and put it in the fish bowl. Now, we all know that just a slip of paper won't keep the kids motivated for long, so what I did was any time I needed a teacher helper, someone to run to the office, really anything at all I would draw a slip out of the fish bowl and whoever's name was on the slip got to be the helper. I always reminded the kids that the more times their name was in the bowl, the better chance they had of being chosen! Also, at the end of each month I would draw out 6 names and those 6 kids would get to eat lunch in the classroom with me and I would always bring a little treat! I wasn't sure how well this would work at first, but let me tell you this was the best way to get all the kids on task and doing what they were supposed to be doing! The minute I picked up my stack of "Caught Ya Being Goods" the room was silent and they were all on task!

This method worked really well for me because it was low maintenence. I gave slips to the specials teachers and subs to hand out if they saw good behavior. Also the monthly lunch/treat was a relatively inexpensive way to offer a reward in my classrom.

If you would like copies of my "Caught Ya" slips you can get a copy HERE and HERE.

If you have any questions about this please feel free to ask! Thanks for taking the time to read my post and if you get a chance stop by my blog "Hoot Hoot Hooray!"

Ms. Walter