Reinforcing positive behaviors by offering a choice of reward

Students can earn virtual awards as a class to earn rewards based on positive behaviors.

Throughout a remote or in-person lesson, to ensure engagement, participation, and build community, students are able to work together toward filling up a Virtual Token Chart. Students can earn virtual tokens as a class or individually to eventually get to 10 and win a prize of their choice. Students can pick between a GoNoodle video, show-and-tell, an extra five-minute break, lunch with the teacher, or other incentives. Positive behaviors can range from everyone coming back from a break on time, to a student being brave and volunteering to present in front of a remote class. Once a token is received, a teacher can share their screen and visually show a token being added to the board so students can track the tokens they have earned. When the token board is full, students earn their reward – either individually or as a class! The token board can be customized with any type of icon to use as tokens (e.g., stars, favorite characters)).

Positive behaviors that teacher could reinforce with tokens include:

• Coming/returning to class on time
• Using hand signals to express thoughts
• All students participating in a discussion
• All students submitting their assignments
• Volunteering to help out in a lesson

NOTE: A fun way to build community in a hybrid environment is to have them all work together to fill a token board based on positive behavior, participation, and engagement. It is also important to monitor who earns rewards and how often rewards are earned to ensure students are getting equitable opportunities to engage and receive positive feedback.