Rewards

Shortly after the children's birthday, Timo started having some major separation anxiety at school. We think it was a combination of being really sick and missing school, family visiting, birthday celebrations, and having a week off of school for winter break. All that inconsistency must have taken a toll on him and he was just craving some sense of schedule and normalcy...which translated into separation anxiety and a full display of emotions each morning at drop-off. Poor guy. So after talking to his teachers, to make sure nothing stressful was happening at school, she suggested some sort of reward system for "happy, happy goodbyes".

I talked up our new sticker reward program all weekend long so by Monday morning they both couldn't wait to get to school so they could give a "happy, happy goodbye!" We went over the levels of rewards...which are the following...
5 stickers=mommy make a special supper of your favorite foods (I rarely take requests for supper)
10 stickers= movie night...watching a big, long movie (vs just a short cartoon)
15 stickers= Dollar Store visit to pick out one toy
20 stickers=lunch out at your fav restaurant

We started our sticker charts on paper plates because they wanted to write their favorite foods on a plate for their first 5 stickers. Here is our movie night...Alvin and the Chipmunks! They loved the movie so much that they by traded their Dollar Store reward for another movie night of Alvin! We popped pop corn and they rounded up all their friends to watch with them.

We are almost at 20 stickers and so far so good...each morning has been big kisses and hugs with a big ol' "happy, happy goodbye!"