Today I'm trying a new thing.
See, Ana is addicted to TV. All day long she asks to watch shows, play on the computer, and watch more shows. I have been very strict with making sure she watches less than 2 hours a day - but that seems like so much still AND she still asks to watch all day.
So to try and curb her appetite, I have started what I call TV Tokens. (Because everything has to be alliterate to be effective, right?)
Every Monday morning I'm giving her 10 marbles. Each marble is worth 30 minutes of TV/computer time. If she wants to watch a show, she pays me a marble (or 3, if its a movie). If she spends them all in 1 day, fine. But then she doesn't get any more for the rest of the week.
Since this allows for less than half of our current TV time, I will give her opportunities to "earn" more if she runs out early in the week. But they will be big things that hopefully will actually distract her and keep her away from the TV for a while longer. Either way, I'll be happy with the results.
I'm not saying this will work, but we're trying it. I will say that its Monday morning and so far she's cashed in 3, and then wanted to earn one back so she cleaned up her entire room by herself without me asking. Heck, that's worth a marble.
update: she has officially spent all her tokens for the week in one day.
5 comments:
wow, this is a fabulous idea! I may have to try this next summer. I've noticed that since Caleb started school, we hardly watch movies anymore(we don't have any tv channels). We used to watch at least one or sometimes 2 each day, but now it's more like 1 or 2 a week! So hopefully when Ana starts school you'll see the same dropoff. :)
That is a rockin' idea. Go Erin! I may have to give this a roll!
I agree that is a FANTASTIC idea!!! & your update made me giggle. =)
great idea. Do you have any for keeping your kids out of the frig! Thank goodness for blogs, I miss you guys but it is always fun to read your blog. I love that you do it so often, it will always be something you will treasure. I need to do better but there is a long list of things I need to do better at and unfortunetly it is not of top yet.
Jamie still misses her best friend Ana on a regular basis. She wanted to show her, her halloween costume but "she lives to far away," is always the reply. On occasion we even get tears when she talks about Ana. I hope you guys are able to come visit sometime so they can play together again. Let Ana know Jamie misses her!
I think the token's idea is a great idea, but maybe when Ana gets a little older. Ellie would do exactly the same thing with her tokens using them all at once, then whine at me for the rest of the week about not being able to watch anything, and that working for them was too hard. Getting rid of the TV was big help for us, but Ellie know it's still possible to watch movies on the computer. I simple don't give her the option. When she asks me, I kindly tell her no, tell her she can be thinking about a movie she would like to watch on the weekend(movie time), even go pick out the movie if she'd like and put it in a "special" place for later Then I give her a choice of 2 or three other things she could do at the moment to distract her. Good luck. It's a hard battle, but definitely one worth winning.
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