Whilst I spin through a really busy time, I wanted to share with you a minor gamification victory with my daughter.
Anyone who has read my blog in the past, will know that I have been trying to use gamification around my daughters behaviour for a few years now. Not all (any) attempts have been 100% successful. The most gut wrenching failure was the use of the reward chart! However, in March, I decided to try a slightly less rewards based system – the Behaviour Meter.
This was a simple chart that displayed numbers 0 to 10, with an arrow pointing to the value that best described my daughters behaviour at the time. Whenever I felt her behaviour changed, I moved the arrow – simple!
Anyway, fast forward to this weekend.
- Daughter: “Daddy, how come I am on an 8 on my chart. I thought I had been naughtier than that”
- Me: “Well, generally you have been pretty well behaved”
- Daughter “I can’t wait to get a 10 on there”
- Me: “That’s great, but you know there is no prize for getting a 10”
- Daughter: “I know that, but I really want to prove I can do it”
She wanted to behave, because she wanted to. There was no desire for a reward behind it, she wanted to do it for her – it was intrinsic!
Now, I call this a massive win for fast and relevant feedback vs extrinsic rewards.
The next step is to lay out a few guidelines that she can follow to get her behaviour up to a 10!
Download a behaviour meter!
- Download the Princess Chart (PDF)
- Download the Super Hero (male) Chart (PDF)
- Download the Super Hero (female) Chart (PDF)
Similar Posts:
- Gamification: Low tech real-time feedback
- The danger of extrinsic rewards on motivation – What I learned from my 5 year old
- Super Nanny and the Gamification of a Generation
Before you lay out the guidelines for her, ask her what behaviors she thinks/feels she will need to accomplish to go from an 8 to a 9. She may already know a few.
Mostly revolves around tidying her room – I already asked lol
Andrzej Marczewski
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