Do you want to encourage more reading in your home? Here’s how to create an extrinsic reward system that will help children develop a love for reading that lasts a lifetime.
I think a lot of us feel like our children should have an intrinsic desire to read, just for the love of reading because most adults get it.
But the reality is that most things don’t become rewarding in and of themselves until you’ve been given LOTS of exposure and positive experience with that thing.
I have done a lot of different things to encourage reading, but the Mom Store has been by far the most effective at getting my children to look forward to reading and fostering that highly desired ability to get lost in a book.
AND it’s self-reinforcing which is huge.
The Mom Store for Reading Success
The Mom Store works so well as a positive reinforcing system by slowly creating an intrinsic love for reading because it gets the behavior going in the right direction.
Here’s how it works:
- Each time a child finishes a book, she is given 1 ticket for every 10 pages that she reads. Books must be at the child’s reading level and the book has to be finished to earn the tickets.
- The kids use their tickets to either purchase snacks or rent “reading buddies” (stuffed animals).
- The Mom Store is only open if all of the kids are committing to the full reading time. It does not open under any other circumstance.
- The snacks and reading buddies can only be used during reading time. They can’t purchase things with their tickets to use later (unless it is a big prize, see below).
Consider adding special coupons for extra fun to your Mom Store. Some things they earn collectively, and others they can earn for themselves. We’ve done special coupons for:
- Lunch Dates With Daddy
- Just Dance Party
- Smoothie Taste Test
- Rootbeer Floats
- Movie Theater
- Picnic
These special prizes will be for more tickets (like 20+) to encourage saving or working together to earn.
Pretty simple so far, right? It is!
What you’ll need:
- A big plastic bin filled with snacks that are not too messy, semi-healthy, and not their everyday snacks (my girls love popcorn, goldfish crackers, and instant oatmeal packets)
- Stuffed animals
- Tickets (We’ve created some tickets for you, available for download below)
- A small container for tickets
- Plastic baggies with each child’s name
- Coupons for special prizes (if including)
Things to decide:
- How long your reading time will be? This will depend on the ages and attention spans of your kids. For younger kids start with 15-30 minutes. Older kids can read for 60 minutes.
- What will be in your snack bin? What novel, healthy snacks would get your kids excited?
- When will your reading time start each day? After lunch? Quiet time? During the baby’s morning nap?
- What will the ticket price be for different snacks?
- Will you have special coupons? What will they be and how many tickets?
After the initial set-up, the Mom Store takes very little effort to operate. You just have to keep it stocked with your kids’ favorite treats.
That’s it! Watch as they get excited for reading time!
Fostering a Love of Reading
A good friend of mine started The Mom Store recently and here’s what she had to say about it:
“A month ago I was struggling to get some of my kids excited about reading so I asked Ralphie for ideas about her Mom Store. I had heard so much about it from her kids in our carpool. In the last month, I now have 2 reluctant readers who ask to read. Giving extra rewards for reading has changed how my kids feel about reading and do not even require extra effort on my part. It is awesome to see my house now full of readers!”
Be creative! Have fun putting a store together.
And most of all, happy reading!!!
If you want to learn more about creating positive momentum, check out these other free resources