There has been a lot of fighting among my children lately. Nothing too dramatic, but they’ve been picking at each other, tattling on each other and trying to get others in trouble and it seriously diminishes the peace in our home.
One night last week before I fell asleep, I was thinking about how it has been frustrating to continually referee their squabbles throughout the day.
I began to pray and ask God what to do to help the fighting stop. How could I lessen the discord in our house?
As I was praying, an idea popped into my head. Last fall we had trouble getting our children to hang up their coats after they came inside. We live in a small space, and coats and boots all over the floor get really tiresome, so we made a reward/penalty system to teach the children to put their stuff away.
We had two jars, and every time someone hung up their coat as soon as they came in, we put a nickel in the good jar. If they forgot to hang up their coat and a parent had to remind them, a nickel got taken out of the good jar and put into the bad jar.
It affected all of them equally when one child forgot, so they soon became really good at reminding each other.
We continued the nickel jar for almost a month until there was $10, and then we went to McDonald’s for ice cream and French fries. By that time, hanging up their coats had become a habit and we didn’t need to continue it.
Could something similar work for eliminating fighting?
This time they each have their own jar. Each morning I put two m&m’s in their jar. When I see them acting kindly toward a sibling or helping someone out I praise them for it and put an m&m in their jar. When they fight, tattle, or annoy others they lose an m&m.
At the end of the day the children get to eat however many m&m’s are left. I decided to make the reward a little closer to the action this time.
I explained the system to them before we started, and told them that if they do something nice and come tell me in hopes of getting an m&m, that doesn’t count. As the mom, I get to decide what counts as an act of kindness.
It isn’t a perfect system, but it has cut out most of the conflict this past week! It has been so good for the children to be more aware of their actions, and good for me as their mom to affirm them verbally for all the ways they show kindness to each other.
I’m hoping that by the time we do this for a month, we will have created habits of love and kindness that will bless our family in months to come.
Do you have any tips for dealing with fighting in your house?
This must be a thing! My 4 and 3 year olds have been tattling sooo much lately. I too was praying about it and asked my sisters in law if they had any ideas. The first grade teacher suggested “marks”. At first I thought that wouldn’t work but then I remembered how ominous getting a MARK was in school. It actually worked well the day I tried it! (One of them has been away since then) The idea is that they’ll get a punishment if they get 5 marks in a day. (Don’t tell them that I don’t know yet what that punishment will be:))