I found this Rewards Calendar in a store that I like very much: Baby Deli. But the concept of this product seems horrible to me. Affirm that commitment and responsibility are fostered through reward. And I'm going to explain what I don't like about this idea.
Tell me, you, when you are kind to your family or friends, do you do it to buy a good gift or to make them happy? Do you think that if we teach children that being kind for a prize they will learn to be for love?
If you look at the things that are mentioned that a child is expected to do, they are pure emotional control and obedience. There is a clear orientation towards lack of empathy and denial of emotion expression: You must not cry, you must sleep alone, obey, go to bed, not protest and to top it all, do not pee. That is, you must shut up, obey and swallow your emotional and physical needs alone and without disturbing.
Prizes are material things and obedience and loss of the ability to download and express their emotions are rewarded. If they do what they expect they receive a material reward : go to the movies, watch TV or eat a lollipop.
It seems to me that all this creates people submissive to authority, unable to express their natural emotions: codependents and unsure of themselves. People who also The reward of life is not love, but objects.
Continuing with the list: the reward is fixed in advance and children know that if they do what they are being asked for, they will get it. In the event that we want our children to do what the calendar asks, which I certainly do not want, it is also not expected to be kind, polite, empathic or collaborative for the love of their parents or for the authentic desire to achieve an equitable family life. Do not. The prize is to watch TV. The prize is one thing.
The days that the promise is fulfilled, for example not peeing on the bed, a candy is put on the calendar as a sign of how "good it has been." Is this better than a punishment?
Actually, I think it's not better. Manipulation and the requirement of blind obedience to norms that are neither suitable for the normal development of a child nor for the assumption of the minimum bases ethics conceptThey seem as dangerous as sending me face to the wall. As much as felt colors that wrap them are as dangerous and painful as a punishment.
