Thursday, September 18, 2008

How do you get your kids to do homework?

With m&m's of course! I actually came up with an idea that worked yesterday! I was eating a handful of m&m's and knew the kids were gonna want some too and since they all needed to work on homework, I told them that for every problem they finish they get 1 m&m. Brogan & Finn jumped right on that! Connor didn't get in on it until he saw that it was actually working with the other kids. Aidan was going along with it too even though he thought that only 1 per problem wasn't enough. But when you have about 40 math problems, that's a lot of m&m's! By the time he got through half of them, he thought it was fun and a really good idea. WOW! I came up with a good idea that they all liked? Unbelieveable! And they all sat at the table being fairly quiet (and when I say that, I mean they weren't fighting and being mean to each other) and they were getting their homework done. They all ended up with a good amount of m&m's and didn't even fight about someone having more than they did. Are these really MY kids? When we were done Finn asked if next time can we do it with something other than candy, like vegetables? I said yeah and started suggesting all kinds of things we could use and they were all suggesting things. It was great! I hope it keeps working in the future.


9 comments:

Carpenters said...

Cute Idea...I will have to give it a try......

Leslie said...

Wow! That's a waaay better idea than all the screaming, threatening, guilting, etc. that I've tried so far.

Seriously, did we have homework in 1st Grade?? I don't think so.

Carpenters said...

Hey Hilary, I love your blog list...when you get a chance send me a link on how to get that. I like how it updates as people post.

CC said...

alright, success!

WillandTara said...

Love it. Like a sticker chart right? I have started giving out pennies for chores when I am desperate. Love this post cause I can so relate.

Whit and Jake said...

No fighting and doing all of their homework in one sitting...holy cow this is exciting. Good job Hil!

Becky said...

Aidan and I think alike, 1 M&M doesnt seem like much! haha I'm glad it made a fun time out of homework.

By they way, I've noticed they are all getting along a lot better lately. Ahhh, a mom's dream come true!

Way to go Reilly kids!!!

ps Leslie ... Our kids didnt have homework in 1st grade either.

WillandTara said...

VEGETABLES! WE DON'T NEED NO STINKIN VEGETABLES!

WE NEED M & M'S!!!

WILL

Anonymous said...

Sure wish I had thought of this when I was a young mom! Way to go Hilary! Aunt Robin