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[Pau]

I feel like this is a white thing lmao.

I'm Latina. Didn't get paid with cash but definitely was rewarded at the end of the year with something. Fear of shame and punishment was still their primary motivational tool though.

 

[Birbo]

No money, but we will take the kids out to dinner of their choice to celebrate good report cards.

 

[Omegasquash]

Incentivizing a child can work. Obviously it varies from kid-to-kid, but I don't see anything necessarily wrong with setting a goal, working towards it, achieving it, and enjoying some benefits from it.

Yes, we know the benefits are potential life-long respect for hard work, but kids may or may not have that kind of foresight.

 

[echoshifting]

This is comes down to intrinsic vs. extrinsic motivation. Any teacher will tell you that intrinsic motivation is better in principle. That doesn't mean that extrinsic motivation isn't useful or effective though. It can be something that you resort to if you are having a difficult time motivating your kid.

Yeah that's pretty much how I feel. I will take the intrinsic motivation for as long as I can, but I'm happy to have extrinsic options in my toolkit.

 

[Alienous]

I'm not a parent, but in secondary/middle school I did have a teacher who would reward top performance with small amounts of money (£1/£2/£5 at most). Didn't do anything for me, and I ended up just turning it down most times.

I understand how it can work, though. We do things to get things we care about having, and there are certainly moments in learning where a subject can be difficult yet necessary, and not particularly rewarding to have success in, so a substitute reward probably helps there (such as money). But I myself never really found learning aversive enough to not just do it because it was asked of me.

 

[M3z_]

Growing up I got $15 for an A and $5 for a B on report cards of which there were 4 a year. Given 6 subjects a quarter that was as much as $90 for straight A's. I never got straight A's, usually I'd get enough to buy a videogame. This was only from 1st to 6th grade though, middle school and forward I didn't get anything.

 

[Lionheart1827]

My Dad did this with my brothers and I back in the day. We never got 100 bucks or anything like that, but we were brought up to value things including money so every little dollar earned mattered to us. I think he had a system set up for the letter grades. I dont remember the value system he had but I think the most I ever got was like 25 bucks

As for my future kids, sure if it seems like they need more of an incentive to do better.

 

[sikkinixx]

One school I work at a lot has kids that get $500+ per A. One very nice and hard working kid (at least when I taught him) cleared $2000 for his straight A report card. And when he got into the university he wanted with a hockey scholarship, dad bought him a BMW.

I mean... spoiled as hell but he straight up told me it made him to his homework and bust his ass because he *really* wanted that car.


When I grew up my grandma usually bought me a new video game at the end of the school year. I still remember getting Link to the Past from the video store that was inside the big supermarket.

 

[Lenardo]

wife does it for a and b grades

something like 10 bucks for an a and 5 for a b

a c nets them -5 dollars (cancelling out a B)
a D or an F is negative 10 dollars (cancelling the A)

 

[Black_Red]

I was paid for grades when I was a kid, 500 CLP (around a dollar) for every max grade(grades go from 1.0 to 7.0 here). That meant I was getting like 2-3 dollars a week. Since I always had grades in the 6.5 - 7 range) It did help me study a little more to secure that dollar lol

 

[Vicetrailia]

This sounds like a good parent thing.

I was always terrible at academics because my mom believed in "laizzeh faire parenting". I think she just didn't give a fuck :/.

 

[Beth Cyra]

I get my children an item of their choice. Like my son will get a game for a good report card.

I have no desire to shame them and want to incentivize good work so I figure this and a hug and work harder next time if he fails is a good setup for him.

 

[PrimaNocta]

I do this somewhat when my daughter brings in ONLY A's & B's. Every progress report(which is around every 2 months) I take my 8 year old daughter to any store she wants and let her pick out anything(within reason) for up to $100. Its usually Gamestop or the Mall. Works out for both of us.

 

[KmA]

I'm Latina. Didn't get paid with cash but definitely was rewarded at the end of the year with something. Fear of shame and punishment was still their primary motivational tool though.

Maybe I'm just bitter but the fear of disappointment and punishment were my primary motivators for grades. I just learned pretty early on not to ask my parents for anything because they never followed through.

 

[C.Mongler]

Not a parent, but my parents growing up paid me $20 when I brought home a report card of straight As. No sliding scale shit, it was all or nothing. I think that worked pretty well honestly, at least until I was old enough to understand that $20 really wasn't enough for shit, because I worked my ass off for those As. I remember the first time I brought home a B, I think in the 6th grade, I had never felt so disappointed in my life. I pleaded with my dad to cut me some slack, maybe slide me a $10 since the rest of my grades were still As, and I swear he looked me in the eye and said "No son, you know the deal, it's $20 for straight As. I hope you try harder next semester". And I'll be damned if I didn't, that was the first and last B I got until high school when I got a job and made 20 bucks for just sitting around for 3 hours.

I knew parents who did that sliding scale stuff though, which made me jealous at the time, but as an adult I don't see the point. I think there's merit for incentivising being the best you can possibly be, but if you're going to give a reward for half-assing it, you'll probably just half-ass it. My best friend's parents would pay him more than I got for straight As when he got straight Cs, so guess what, his grades were just kind of shit.