a new plan

The desire for spending time in front of the TV/Play Station/computer had reached, what felt like, a new all-time high at our house lately. There are a lot of factors that play into why our children were spending more and more time in front of screens, but it was becoming apparent that it was a problem that needed to be dealt with. 

 So we have a new plan - who knows if it'll work in the long run, but after one week we're pretty pleased with it. Here's how it works: Each kid gets five, 30 minute screen time tickets for the week to use how and when they chose. In addition to that each kid was given a set of four tasks/goals/chores to be done on each weekday. Noah's were practicing piano, 15 minutes of reading, being nice to Levi, feeding the dog and cats. Some of them are simple chores, others like being nice to Levi was something that Ben and I decided at the end of each day. The goal of the chart is to complete all the tasks each day with the reward being a ticket for 30 minutes of screen time over the weekend. If they do everything on the chart they've earned two hours of screen time to use over the weekend.

 Levi managed to get all his tasks done and enjoyed using his extra tickets this weekend. Noah didn't complete everything (practicing piano has certainly been a struggle!) so he learned the hard way this weekend that it's worth doing everything on the chart. A Sunday full of NFL football with only one ticket to use was pretty hard for football-loving Noah.

We've adjusted the tasks for week two to address some of the behavioral challenges going on around here (i.e. showering and going to bed without fighting or crying). We'll see how that goes.