The Good Behavior Game

[@MeesterG]

My brother just shared another cool idea with me (I am a teacher) Give the students a 'secret mission', like holding the doors for others, or helping out people with cleaning up. As soon as another coworker tells me that they've noticed how well behaved my students were, the class gets a reward. Like 10 minutes extra play time outside. I have done this 2 days so far, but it already worked like a charm!

[@masterpieces2218]

Anything will work as long as u say extra play time 🙃 ur welcome

[@hugofontes5708]

That's freaking genius

[@Victoria-dh9vb]

Get yourself two buckets and some marbles. Start off the week with all the marbles in the bad bucket, and the kids have to work to get all the marbles into the good bucket and keep them there. If they manage to have all the good marbles over on Friday they get a reward. I swear to God this was the most brilliant thing my one teacher ever did. We had a really disruptive class, which isn't surprising since the boy to girl ratio was 3:1. She could get us to be quiet just by taking a fist full of good marbles and slowly dropping them back into the bad side. Worked like a charm. Can't speak for the long term effects, our class caused a number of teachers to have mental break downs later, so there is that.

[@PsychoVdude13x]

I remember we'd play "the quiet game" and I felt really competitive about it.

[@lorenrenee1]

PsychoVdude13x my kids excellent at the quiet game.

[@metametodo]

That sounds very cute

[@Romizumab]

So, basically, what the Hogwarts teachers do.

[@dothmotherknowyouwearth]

Oh, right!

[@Jakers457]

Basically a good number of British schools

[@phoenixx8963]

wait, american schools dont have a point system for their houses/forms???

[@jaynedavis3388]

But without the reckless endangerment (kids on flying brooms & literal monsters on the grounds)

[@Kikakowia]

The Chaotic Phoenixx American schools don’t even _have_ houses, and I’m not even sure what you mean by forms. I’m pretty sure there are a lot of younger American kids who think J. K. Rowling just made all that stuff up for the Harry Potter books. XD It’s too bad honestly, I think I would’ve enjoyed the system when I was in school!

[@dorkyface]

You know, I kind of picked up on this when learning about video game design. You see, the developers of a game might expect/want players to play their game in a certain way, but, players being players, that's not how it usually turns out. In say XCOM, the developers wanted the players to take risks, sprint out in the open, etc, but players found the most optimal strategy was crawling at a snail's pace from objective to objective. So in XCOM 2, the dev's included turn timers that would say the players lose if they didn't complete certain objectives in time... a feature that is nearly universally hated. What's the lesson here? Well, as it turns out, if you want people to do things, you should ENCOURAGE the desired behavior, rather than punishing "Wrong" behavior. The way this could translate into XCOM is if there were objectives that *could* be obtained if players took more risks, which would encourage that playstyle, but the snail's-pace strategy could still be done at a loss of bonus objectives. tl;dr Rewarding the "correct" behavior is often better than punishing the "wrong" behavior.

[@lionsandmoon]

Works on dogs, too. (I'm not joking.)

[@zmollon]

What if you have 10 minutes of free time given to the class on the board that's time that they've earned already at the start of the day and whenever there's misbehavior you remove one minute. Because of loss aversion this should theoretically be more effective than giving a minute after a period of time where the rules have been followed but it feels like punishing rather than rewarding. Thoughts?

[@ben5056]

Having a child taught me how important the influence of positive reinforcement is. Just a laugh or smile reinforces a behavior (good or bad) very quickly.

[@Karishma_Unspecified]

They did a version of the "good behaviour game" (involving groups of kids) when I was growing up. I hated it. It was a reason for everyone to target each other in very passive aggressive ways. As a girl with a disability, who already struggled to fit in - I felt like the stakes were higher now. And that everyone had even more incentive to hate me. Maybe it's just me - but maybe the social pressure increases offsets any good behavior benefits in girls.

[@bekkaanneee]

i was waiting all video for them to bring this up- for kids that were bullied or outcasts, games like this can just increase those experiences through peer pressure

[@linneathesystemsdruid308]

That is exactly what I was thinking. The “girl game” is a nightmare, I have autism and so I already had trouble understanding my peers and once they started to play the “girl game” in about first grade my life became hell, something that helped me was that my teacher in kindergarten did another thing to try and get my class to behave she bought little mouse toys to be are desk buddys and if you were to loud your mouse would be scared and run away also if someone else at your table was really loud they would scare all the mice away to me at least this seemed to be the perfect way to get a quiet class because nobody wanted to be to loud and scare off all the mice

[@delphinidin]

Yes! I'm thinking of kids with ADHD who really CAN'T follow all the rules, and then their team always loses, and then the members of their team HATE THEM. This sounds like a TERRIBLE idea.

[@ESL-O.G.]

what was your disability?

[@Karishma_Unspecified]

@@ESL-O.G. I have loose connective tissue disorder, scoliosis, depression, anxiety and possibly autism and trauma (depending on your definition of the 2). The first 2 (physical disorders) are the more obvious ones which prevented people from connecting with me - they result in a slew of things like having to wear a back brace throughout high school, walking with a pronounced limp, spraining/dislocating knees/ankles/shoulders really often, having poor balance, inability to walk fast, stand for a while, poor fine motor skills etc. Long way of saying that I never did, nor do I now, fit in. I'm more at peace with the situation now, but it has been a wild ride getting here

[@rea8585]

Never heard of that in my studies (and I did some pedagogy classes). Another proof that we need to step up and modernize our educational system a bit 😀

[@celinak5062]

Like Olweus anti-bullying program and montessori schools

[@BothHands1]

Absolutely 100% I've never heard of this either, even though i did a BS in Neuroscience. Very interesting that it only worked on boys. Before the hormones kick in, i wonder what makes them so much more disruptive. They should be about the same, I'd think. Unless the difference is in nurture rather than nature, which is seeming like the most likely cause. Be it TV or games or most likely parent biases, it seems that the way boys are raised differently from girls from birth is the primary culprit. A societal issue, rather than a genetic issue. Hmm, though over centuries of societal factors might play a part in the natural selection and passing on of genes in males. So it's possible there is a genetic factor too. I wonder. Really hope to see more about this soon

[@beth8775]

@@BothHands1 The big difference is socialization.

[@BothHands1]

Bethany Lade yeah, I'm guessing that's the primary factor

[@claudiu7909]

​@@BothHands1 I think you have a clue about why it works in the type of activities they prefer. Girls are more inclined to activities that require care and attention, boys like activities that require a lot of energy, running, climbing. I'm not saying that girls don't like running from time to time or boys don't like to play less active games. Most boys have a lot of energy that needs to be used, therefore you put them to sit still on a chair for six hours and stare at a board. If that sounds like a bad idea, it's because it is, but that's how our education system works. I think the good behavior game works because it gives them something to work on, a goal to achieve or something to redirect their extra energy and attention to. After a while they acquire some good habits and also after they grow a bit they get less energetic. Girls can be energetic too, but usually not as much as the boys.

[@Shatterverse]

I expect this game thing breaks down if a kid doesn't care about the reward, punishment, or peer opinion.

[@dhkukulka666]

Yes, it actually cascades to nobody caring because if one kid doesn't care and reaches the limit of 'lack of reward' without signs of concern, then not only 'lack of reward' stops being a biggie but also the reward looses its attractiveness.

[@SyukriLajin]

and those kids are the hardest to handle in the first place.

[@iprobablyforgotsomething]

They're not always spoiled attention-hogs or troublemakers. Sometimes they're the kid who doesn't automatically fall into group-think and peer pressure, but instead looks at made-up pseudo-rewards/social shaming and/or punishment systems and says "why? why should I?" in honest confusion or indignation. Which, upon failing to receive a sensible answer, becomes "then go ahead and 'take points' or flunk me, I don't respect you so I don't care". That was my cousin in school.

[@Tahoza]

You are correct. In this case, the "reward" or "punishment" is simply not either one of those. If the "reward" is not rewarding... it is just a thing at that point.

[@haileyb352]

When I was in first grade I happened to be in a group with one of these students. Our half of the class lost the game without fail for months before the teacher finally decided to remove the disruptive kid from the game all together. Even after that our spirits were broken, we only won maybe a quarter of the time for the rest of the year.

[@JoonHee]

As a teacher, I find this information very compelling and would like to read some more about it. Unfortunately, the sources posted are incorrect. :s I would like to learn more about Venus, but I prefer articles related to the GBG. Please make the correction! =D EDIT: Thanks for the quick fix!

[@ameliorated]

i think its fixed

[@mariovelez578]

OMEGA LOL

[@vlr7368]

You're a teacher and use text emojis? That's interesting.

[@the7th494]

You mean emoticons?

[@RocketJo86]

I didn't know that it has a name, but I use a version of it with my students, wherein when they bring a task to an end we play a game afterwards instead of giving them a new assignment. And it works with every single one, boosting their willingness to take on tasks they normally avoid.

[@ShazzyZang211]

I have ADHD and anxiety issues so this would have probably been a disaster for me. I was already afraid of annoying the people around me so this would have just left me an absolute nervous wreck.

[@kittycat7471]

I was thinking about the neurodivergent kids too. They call it good behavior but what they mean is neurotypical behavior, making kids like you feel like they're bad kids when they can't help it.

[@phelan_pt]

Yeah, that's one of my issues with this. The other is that it trains comforming to authority and peer groups as a good thing, when that's not always true.

[@ragnkja]

Kitty Cat Well said. I frequently spoke “out of turn” due to my impulsiveness, but I hardly ever chatted off topic with my peers during class.

[@bk2pla]

I am also, and I had plenty of peers already letting me know I was weird and bully fodder. I would imagine it would have been worse if I had also ruined some group goal. More recess bullying. One teacher did use a version of it, but just for me, no other kids involved. I got a reward, like a cookie, at the end of each day if I wasn’t disruptive. That was my best year of school, 2nd grade, of all 12 years. It’s not good to highlight ADHD behaviors to the rest of the class, they don’t need anymore reasons to pick on a kid who’s different. Btw, I still don’t like working in groups, 40 years later.

[@Hellion912]

Just popping in the say me too. The whole time he was speaking, I was feeling that familiar dread in my stomach of being a constantly high strung bundle of nerves, trying so hard to not ruin "the game" for my group, that it completely distracts me from learning and probably would have caused me to just shut down several times during the day from being in such a state of high tension.

[@phelan_pt]

Can whoever is in charge of posting the descriptions update the sources? They're currently all about Venus, asteroids, and other space science. I'm assuming it was a copy paste gone wrong?

[@EcceJack]

Oh dear! Well spotted

[@phelan_pt]

Thanks for the fix! :)

[@Sashimi_luv]

Idk as a teacher myself, I've always thought it was obvious that it's BETTER to reward good behaviors than punish the 'bad ones'. Because usually it's a cry for help whether the child knows it or not. Positive reinforcement does absolute WONDERS for children. Because so often they are just used to being told "no" or threatened to stop misbehaving. When you instead recognize and point out great behavior they instantly want to win more of your approval.

[@kitsunek0]

As a lot of nerodivergent people have mentioned in the comments, these 'games' dont work for everyone and in some cases can make competition where none needs to exist on top of issues with anxiety and frustration for the students it doesnt work for. What does work is PBIS and encourage everyone to look into that a lot more. Positive Behavior Interventions and Support works similarly in promoting good behavior via reward, but rather than singling out children who are disruptive for public shaming, allows teachers and support staff to work together to understand when a student is being disruptive and find the root cause behind disruptive behavior. PBIS is perhaps more helpful for some nerodivergent children because it combines instant and long term rewards for good behavior without punishment or without punishing 'team mates' but more importantly it encourages what we call 'learned empathy.' Where students not only get rewarded for good behavior, but spend part of their curriculum learned what good behavior is, what is expected, and what good citizenship looks like. Especially for children who have a hard time recognizing empathy or emotions, it gives them practice in that aspect and teaches them at least the physical motions and expectations in each scenario even if they cannot empathize... Seriously look into PBIS. If anyone has more questions on it, I'm literally part of a consulting team teaching these new tools to teachers nation wide.

[@phelan_pt]

Thanks, I'll look into this :)

[@robertkalinic335]

Can you use this method to indoctrinate somebody into religion or state ideology? This method isnt improving what and how are kids taught in schools, just sit and memorize stuff you dont care about until we let you out and if you behave you get a cookie.

[@kitsunek0]

@@robertkalinic335 I mean... maybe? But I dont see it being really all that effective. PBIS focuses on expectations and engagement we all have to understand as people within a society. It doesnt place any one individual above the system as religion and nationalism would. You listen when someone is talking because it is respectful and teachers are as responsible for modeling that behavior and respecting their students as students are expected to respect their teacher. I like to think PBIS goes beyond teaching the rote memorization of facts and shows students how to not only feel compassion for others, but how apply that compassion in every day scenarios. Take the example of one kid dropping their lunch tray all over the floor. TV shows exhibit this situation with derision and laughter at the poor kid. Where as kids who have grown up with PBIS or similar programs, I've witnessed middle schoolers who hop up into action, some helping the fallen student, some helping to clean, some offering part of their lunch in compensation. I mean say what you want about the school curriculum, but I think any system that treats people no matter their age, races, sex, orientation, socioeconomic standing or ability with dignity and respect and rewards that behavior cant be a bad thing.

[@3possumsinatrenchcoat]

as someone with anxiety, adhd, and autism who was subjected to variations on this, I can clearly report that it's a great way... to make a child already ostracized by their peers and miserable even worse off and stressed than before. :))))))

[@hayleyotto8932]

"You know how you already feel hopeless and like you can't do anything right? You know how your classmates treat you badly because you don't conform? Yeah, let's just go ahead and keep that up, but more so!"

[@horusbay]

I taught elementary to 3rd and 4tg graders and this is a strategy I used for 6 months and it was surprisingly beneficial for a group whom suddenly became my class because their previous teacher was having problems dealing with behavioral "problems" that the students were having. I added a twist to it and unified it with Economy Points, where students got points to spend at the end of the week in exchange for candy and goodies, being a languages teacher I had to make them speak the target language and in exchange they followed 5 simple rules. "Whole brain teaching" is something I used too with them and it was a lot of fun!

[@jasperyap2389]

I had a similar experience in primary school. Though the class(I was in the first class, where all the supposedly 'good students' are) was divided into 4 groups, the only other difference is that the winner is awarded and the loser gets extra homework. I was already a rowdy tomboy-ish girl, plus my group mates were as rowdy as me. This caused our group marks to go from an initial 100 to -500 in a month (because group marks would reset every month). We would just not care and be rebellious because we were sick and tired of teachers making us single our friends out instead of helping them. Even when we got the punishments, we didn't care. We stopped doing homework, we stopped doing our duties (cleaning the classroom), we stopped listening in class. In the end, the teacher had to remove the points system because we were slowly influencing not just our class, but the entire school. No point system whatsoever, just no. I don't like to single people out.

[@celinak5062]

+

[@davidsirmons]

Even when they deserve it and caused it to begin with? You're not a commune. You're individuals. If someone is causing trouble, a good friend would encourage them to stop causing trouble.

[@LordAlacorn]

You where a Heroes - Viva La Revolution! :)

[@hayleyotto8932]

@@davidsirmons Yeah speaking as somebody who went through this kind of system, good friends don't encourage you to do better. The rest of the team just tries to bully you into complying. And if you have a preexisting issue causing your behavior, the bullying doesn't fix it. It just makes you feel worthless.

[@BrainsApplied]

*Oh, this reminds me of the keep-your-mouth-shut game.* I've been playing that soooooo often 😂

[@davidsirmons]

*This reminds me of the 'shut up or I'll beat your ass game.* Boy I was good at that one!

[@luciferangelica]

this must be the reason people keep saying i'm a loser

[@MysticMindAnalysis]

The good behaviour game seems to be of greater benefit to neurotypical kids. Unless we are aware of the limitations that learning difficulties or other such neurological conditions have, it could easily lead, especially smaller children, to view struggling with a particular task as being badly behaved. I also think we need to be extremely careful when it comes to cultivating social exclusion. Kids who are vulnerable to bullying could have this kind of game weaponized against them if sabotaged. Of course, all this can be mitigated through mindfulness from the teacher, it's just important to recognise such risks.

[@carissstewart3211]

My son was recently diagnosed with ADHD and the psycologist recommended a couple books. This exact thing was described in Taking Charge of ADHD by Russell Barkley, PhD. Boys with ADHD (probably the most disruptive students in the typical classroom) do seem to respond well to this. At home, our son can earn poker chips for good behaviors, which he can then redeem for privileges. It has cut down on family drama significantly.

[@MysticMindAnalysis]

@@carissstewart3211 I think it's easier to control and mitigate risks when you're at home, since it's just them as an individual rather than their behaviour being counted as part of a team. Plus, you as a mother can understand your child's learning difficulties in a different way to a teacher. This isn't to discount the benefit of these types of games, and it's great that it helps your little one! Just like with all science, it can be context sensitive. But your feedback is what makes good science grow into something better :).

[@lindenbree9188]

I agree, I hated games like this as a kid. No one wants to be on the team of the disruptive weirdo who always screws it up for everyone else, and my peers were vocal about that. I didn't understand what I did wrong, so my choices were to shut up and not participate at all, or try to participate and get my team in trouble, which led to more bullying. Insert a lifetime of social anxiety problems here, it happens when you're conditioned to believe participation leads to ridicule! Though really, trying a one-size-fits-all teaching approach to 30 kids at a time is never going to work for all the children. If this works for /most/ kids, I guess it's one of the better options, despite being incredibly detrimental to some.

[@3possumsinatrenchcoat]

as someone with anxiety, adhd, and autism who was subjected to variations on this, I can also clearly report that it's a great way... to make a child already ostracized by their peers and miserable even worse off and stressed than before. :))))))

[@Ghennesph]

plot twist: girls typically play this game among themselves by default, due to social influence.

[@williamsimkulet7832]

I'm worried about two aspect of these "games": (1) the team aspect, and (2) the single-out aspect. The former seeks to punish (well, deny benefits) students for their teammates behavior. Admittedly the "both win" threshold seems like a way to mitigate this, provided there are no students "trying to be bad" and no neuroatypical students whose behavior would count against the game. However, even w/o the team dynamic, it's possible this might single out "problem" students publicly.

[@d_lynn421]

My 6th grade teacher had a version of this for homework. Points awarded for everyone at the table having their homework done. I was that kid who struggled and brought my team down. My peers turning on me didn't help w the issues I was already dealing with and instead of getting my work done I just spiralled. That was over 2 decades ago yet I can still remember wishing I could melt into the floor.

[@williamsimkulet7832]

@@d_lynn421 Ideally, it would be sufficient to turn something in (not get a 100% on an assignment); but yeah that's what I'm afraid of here - shaming others away from bad behavior is different from shaming people because of their lack of proficiency with the material. This is one reason why teachers should never give 0s for (non-plagiarized) assignments that are turned in; something should always be better than nothing.

[@hochibamabinladenhusainefe8191]

@@d_lynn421 my 5th grade teacher devided us into groups, and based points off the same system. Gotta say its very broken in my opinion

[@mikeg9b]

The U.S. Army is big on "group punishment" when one Soldier does something wrong. I didn't like it when I was punished for things I didn't do, but it did set up a system of peer pressure for everyone to follow the rules. And if there's one population group that could use some retraining on learning to follow rules, it's new recruits in the military.

[@KaylaNoelle1]

Any teacher who tried to use negative reinforcement just made child-me think “alright if that’s how you want to do things it’s time to ruin your life!” I hated being treated like a little prisoner when I’d never even done anything to deserve it and I was forced to be there all day, it makes a child feel so trapped. The DEFAULT for my elementary school was to treat us all like we were horrible little monsters... so we became anxious and sad and we began to prove them right. 🤷🏻‍♀️

[@seatbelttruck]

I have to wonder if this might cause further frustration for neuro-atypical kids. A lot of disruptive classroom behaviors can be difficult for kids with, say, ADD or Autism to avoid. That'd run the risk of further alienation by peers. That'd be a good thing to look at in a future study if they could figure out how to set it up.

[@SLiviuD]

This seems like an awful idea tho, personally. Conditioning like this seems wrong. Conditioning seems like a really bad way to teach someone something. Arguably, cruel too. Teaching them to stay in line else they will get hated by their peers, and never question authority or the status quo seems like a bad idea. Honestly im glad this isnt widespread. This seems exactly like one of those things that at a glance seems like a good idea, but all it does is oversimplifies its model of things just to try to prove a point, and in that oversimplification, the negatives and drawbacks of the method are obscured. Just because you can condition children to follow rules that simulate the behaviour of good people, doesn't mean you taught them to be good people.

[@unitymomentum]

I totally agree!! Thanks

[@bunsenn5064]

I do believe the idea of positive reinforcement for good manners should have some kind of presence in the classroom. If a child is invested in learning and paying attention, they should be encouraged to continue doing so. Reward the good so they are motivated to do more good, and rather than penalizing the bad, have processes set up that make good behavior seem more appealing than bad behavior. Questioning thinking is a healthy thing, it helps the brain of a growing child understand the mechanics and processes of the world around them that they, and everyone they know, live in. But while rebellious thought is the seed for innovation, rebellious behavior hinders the efficiency of putting that thought onto paper and making something interesting out of it.

[@cantbeleveitsnotnaru]

I can see this model being really bad for kids with disabilities... I know I had undiagnosed ADHD, and would have failed at this miserably and the idea of my disability having further social consequences is terrifying.

[@Sashimi_luv]

Also instead of team points, awarding tiny stickers to individual students to put on a personal folder ALSO gets kids/teens excited. Like no joke ALL ages go crazy for *good* stickers. You don't even have to promise more reward than that.

[@christafranken9170]

I second that, it even worked in my sixth grade high school class (18 year olds)

[@pinkwings8036]

I’m an adult and I’d jump through a lot of metaphorical hoops to earn cool stickers

[@zethany9485]

I remember this from grade school days and it didn't exactly work as there were lots of disruptive kids that thrived on making the class miserable, so they would deliberately act out to make odds worse for the team. If you got put on the team with the rowdy kid, good luck winning...

[@kyrakia5507]

The idea of teachers giving certain rewards or privileges to students who follow the school rules with good behaviour seems pretty ubiquitous, as does the utilisation of peer pressure. It may not go by that name all the time, nor be set up the same way, but why is it such a big revelation that this specific utilisation of commonly used methods is successful. If there is an incentive to obey a set of rules, and disincentive for not doing so, then more are going to obey those rules.

[@beth8775]

And yet the mere existance of the rules & consequences is not enough. These studies show that more direct & more easily observable rewards significantly increase compliance with those rules.

[@theocaratic]

The GBG seems just be an easy way of bringing together a few principles: Rules, rewards, and punishments should be clear and tangible Focus on rewarding the good Involve positive peer pressure Make it into a game/make it fun sure, it might not be completely revolutionary, but it makes it easy to implement the principles that we already know work.

[@bigmike4133]

Plus one point for Gryffindor

[@jerry3790]

Ok. Now we need a version for high school students.

[@unstoppable_disappointment]

Exactly the same. Just offer rewards for good behaviour and work. Make it competetive. Hormonal teenagers love to compete.

[@Grim_Sister]

Tokens for alcohol? XDD

[@JustusWilcox]

Reward flashlights and dildos.

[@interstellarsurfer]

@@unstoppable_disappointment Some of them, yes.

[@mikeg9b]

And adults: rewards for recycling, conserving electricity and water, volunteering in the community, etc.

[@abstruseglitch]

I'd be interested in seeing an episode on oppositional defiant disorder

[@kated442]

It works until kids decide it's funny to upset the ones who want to win...

[@interstellarsurfer]

Yes, I remember certain days when my unruly classmates (and I) made a game of flipping the rules, to see who could lose the game fastest, or accrue the most punishment. That's how you can tell the *really good* teachers apart from the middling ones. Your average teacher gets offended to downright abusive. The good ones see what little 💩's your being, and run with it. 👌

[@kariscoyne1886]

Explanation: Growing up as a girl is literally just a constant stream of "don't sit like that, don't be so loud, don't eat like that, don't say those things", boys exposed to a once-a-week session of the 'that's unladylike' treatment suddenly start behaving better

[@geodarian1361]

abd then the good kids get a treat

[@MEGABLAMP]

token economies and tit for tat models can back fire pretty bad in some cases. a lot of the prison social economy is based off of tit for tat for example.

[@BlazeOGlory]

I think I have heard something like this about students in Japan. In that country good performance and behavior are valued and society rewards those things. It also punishes those who act out, but if I understood it correctly it was more about the piers of the misbehaving children that looked down on the behavior. In a lot of cases where someone may act out for attention or to stand out if you take the child's incentive to act out away they don't really do it as much.

[@nateslovebug]

I am curious about the inpack of this on children with ADHD. It isn't an issue of motivation there, and the imposed peer pressure could be very detrimental.

[@beth8775]

I'm not sure overall, but I think (as a parent of a child with ADHD) that having the tally so visible on the board would help keep the possible rewards front and center in the child's mind. It would take time, but it's a lot like the advice I read in a parenting/ADHD book.

[@UnknownFlyingPancake]

I wonder this with autism also. These rulesets seem incredibly punishing towards those who have actual trouble controlling certain responses despite absolutely trying their best and really WANTING to be good, and very easily abused by teachers who have it out for particular students, especially those who are unpopular. A common tactic by sadistic teachers and students with bullying tendencies is to knowingly goad a child into reacting negatively so they can get punished, or a group of students talking and then blaming it on the kid who no one would defend because they aren't popular. That kind of thing could happen with any child even. For example a kid raising their hand to go to the bathroom, but the teacher personally doesn't like them so never calls on them. So the kid just leaves and because of that, the team they were on lose their privileges and harasses them. Or their pencil rolls off the table and they need to leave their seat to pick it up. A teacher could easily abuse it so only kids who are absolutely silent at all times and never try to be engaged by asking questions or discussing get privileges. For some their classroom only exists to feed their ego and desire to control rather than learning and growing.

[@3possumsinatrenchcoat]

as someone with both adhd and autism, i thought this as well. seems like a terrible way to not just punish a kid for not being neurotypical enough *and* turn their peers against them. kids are ruthless when competition is introduced and as someone that's been on the recieving end of things like that? yeah, it sucks.

[@JRLB38]

impact

[@3possumsinatrenchcoat]

@@beth8775 the thing about this though, is it's not an individual thing. it's putting a group of kids together in a team and thus subjecting the child to the ire of their peers when they act out of turn and lose their team points.

[@SmallAngryNerd]

now i understand better why my elementary school (which used the stick/card system, basically 3 strikes and your out type thing) had pretty rowdy kids. negative reinforcement didn't turn out too well

[@jennadawn]

Curious to know how this would affect children who have mild to moderate learning disabilities, and those with autism as not every school has the capabilities to have programs and funding to have different classrooms for those with other needs.

[@hayleyotto8932]

Speaking from experience, badly. Very very badly.

[@TheStarBlack]

My son's school have always done this. He hates it as it removes all fun and socialising our of the classroom. He's only 7.

[@pinkwings8036]

This would definitely need the teacher to be aware of coping techniques for kids who would need them, and able to connect kids with the proper help if at all possible. Giving things like ADHD a better outlet would give the kid in question techniques they could use and keep the class calm.

[@drcelialie]

This is great, and basically sums up my entire 2-hour lecture I was planning on teaching next week! Thanks!

[@HunterSentinel]

This is my experience in a nutshell. I’m always the one singled out.

[@LePedant]

I really respond to positive reinforcement and shut down on negative reinforcement.

[@fredgotpub871]

The biais is those studies must be huge, I'm reluctant to trust them, it seems too easy.

[@starscarrednyx]

Good job SciShow! Getting "good grades" (or being "good") was what was expected of us (my fam) - without benefit reciprocation. Grow up without "carrots", where only the stick exists, leads to mutated self worth and values, and an inability to follow thru on goals, esp ones that require work and not habit. Those carrots teach kids how to approach goals and learn: A) To operate within social limits (ie. Manners). B) Success is nice, it feels good despite hard work. C) Lets you live a better life.

[@Hakyoku7]

I actually am a teacher of a couple years now, and I can say 2 things from my experience... 1. In higher education(#CWU) there is very little behavior management training, or practical preparation. 2. Working in schools I've noticed a lot of attention to positive behavior intervention strategies(PBIS)

[@elif6908]

It's not weird that this "game" doesn't work for female students, because what this game does for boys is to socialize them in ways girls have been socialized by their parents and peers and every other adult in their lives. Girls thought very early that, if you're to exist within a group, whether that's a classroom of kids or kids your family friends have, you have to behave in certain ways or you're called out and expelled from the setting, either physically or emotionally, like being ignored by the other kids. Much more importantly, when the girls in trouble go to their parents with their peer problems, they are encouraged to change themselves and fit into the group and to the existing rules, much like in "The Good Behavior Game". I, anecdotally, of course, don't see this kind of socialization in boys and in their group dynamics. And they are not encouraged to change themselves when they have peer or socialization problems, but they are encouraged to go on with their disruptive behaviors. Maybe they are even encouraged to double down on these behaviors with inaction and permissiveness from their parents.

[@elif6908]

I also have to add that this difference in socialization in genders is one of the reasons girls are much less likely to be diagnosed with ADD/ADHD and why they are diagnosed with depression or anxiety later in life. Women with ADD/ADHD use mimicry to cope with social problems early in life. But they don't internalize the reasoning behind these actions, they simply store mimic actions for later and use these as masks to put on in socal situations. Many women with ADD/ADHD talk about "running scripts of small talk/interest talk/social setting interaction", but as their internal understanding of social settings and their scripts move apart, they start to feel lost and fake and less, thus they are diagnosed as depressed as a result of their ADD/ADHD, but rarely get the real diagnoses they need, ADD/ADHD.

[@jprochnau33]

@@elif6908 I am an adult woman with ASD this is exactly what happened. It's sad that nobody else in the comments has brought up how radically different girls are socialized and from a much younger age.

[@amicableenmity9820]

@@jprochnau33 same here.

[@luciferangelica]

if that's how they teach girls, it didn't work on me

[@luciferangelica]

@@elif6908 or because adhd is capitalizing on people's natural response to overstimulation to sell drugs to children

[@matejabrkic7747]

Divide and Conquer

[@Sgt-Gravy]

I was one of those students that would ruin it for my team & felt bad I couldn't control myself. So I was mad at myself a lot & so was most of my classmates.

[@d_lynn421]

My 6th grade teacher had a version of this for homework. Points awarded for everyone at the table having their homework done. I was that kid who struggled and brought my team down. My peers turning on me didn't help w the issues I was already dealing with and instead of getting my work done I just spiralled. That was over 2 decades ago yet I can still remember wishing I could melt into the floor.

[@Siphonife]

@@d_lynn421 I feel like this could of easily been avoided if the teacher encouraged the people who did have their work done to help those who didn't if they wanted to win. Instead of just putting negative pressure thinking thats the only thing one would respond to. Some just shut down. Encourage bringing each other up instead of pressuring to force them to do work. I struggled with motivation in my school years and I hated the judgement for not having work done but all that negativity did was decrease my motivation and confidence further.

[@garypalmer997]

Please do a show on the failure to reproduce the ego depletion theory findings and what that means

[@yuirick]

Good good, this will be perfect for my cult indoc- Religious study classes. Yes.

[@phelan_pt]

Yeah, this is the same problem I have with this, it establishes peer pressure to follow rules from authority as a good thing, regardless of what the rules are. I don't think that's always a good thing.

[@shibolinemress8913]

Back in 1971, my 3rd grade teacher Mrs. Osur offered weekly "Good Person Awards" to the past week's best behaved or most improved students. They were simple index cards with colourful smilies and some personal inspirational words, but boy did we work hard to get them! Each card cost next to nothing, but had an amazing impact for good. To this day, Mrs. Osur is the teacher I remember most fondly of all. Edit: The difference between this and the Good Behaviour Game is that we weren't divided into teams, and each student got an individual award, so there was no group pressure as such, but rather we were simply encouraged to improve ourselves. The downside was that there could have been some toxic envy between students, but don't remember that happening.

[@JosephDavies]

This seems like it's going to be most effective on kids who are competitive (at least the team-based version of the game). I wonder how that factors into the results. I am also curious about how to design benefits for this that aren't zero-sum, like the "line up first" reward. The free-time reward can be granted to everyone, even if both teams win, but some cannot. As an aside regarding that "more dramatic results for boys" aspect , I _can't wait_ to see these studies reported on with bogus headlines like "Studies show girls can't be taught good behavior". >_

[@Alina28357]

I never really liked this kind of rule enforcement as a student. I felt manipulated and pitted against others in an us vs. you way but maybe that is also because our teachers never ever followed through with the promised reward...

[@curtiswilson859]

Oh man I had a teacher try this on us in 5th grade and it quickly became a contest to see who could get the highest (ie worst) score. I always felt bad for that guy.

[@ArgumentativeAtheist]

Just a point of interest. Getting just the boys in the class to behave will also benefit the girls, as the girls will have less disruption to their education.

[@galli0]

I dont remember where i saw it or if its true, but all girls schools do much better than mixed or all boys schools, and all boys schools do worse off by far, so much so that it was almost deemed unethical

[@ArgumentativeAtheist]

Speaking as a teacher I wouldn't be even slightly surprised to find that this is true.

[@MatthewMartinez314]

@SciShow Psych I love that you cite your sources!

[@ArchRuler]

played that game. lost the game. now im an outcast. yeet.

[@phelan_pt]

I'd also be very curious how kids taught with this game would react later in life if they had to play "The Unfair Rule" game versus kids who didn't.

[@luciferangelica]

what's that?

[@phelan_pt]

@@luciferangelica Sorry, I made up the name. I intended it to be the same as "The Good Education" game, except you one (or more) of the rules the teacher has you follow are unfair to some (or all) of the students. Would they be more or less likely to follow the unfair rule due to previous influence from "The Good Education" game? Would they be more or less likely to push back against it? I think there's some issues with peer pressure and submission to authority in the game as stated, and I don't feel like it would always be a positive thing. Hope this explains better :)

[@luciferangelica]

oh, thanks for the clarification

[@avicohen2k]

Not helpful in the long term. I was told that being a good student will get me into college and I'll be rewarded with a good job which would make me successful and even happy. So I did, but but never got my reward...

[@a.r.5718]

*good behaviour game exists Abusive teacher: "Ight imma head out."

[@luciferangelica]

if you don't eat your meat...you know the deal

[@lisa_42]

We had such a system in second grade. We had groups who sat together at grouped tables and each group had a glass. When someone did something good like present their homework the group would get a glass stone in the glass and when the group was loud and wouldn't stop they could lose stones. If you had enough stones you could buy stuff with it for example one day without homework. The most expensive thin was a sleepover at the school with the whole class. It worked like a charm and since you couldn't get to negative stones you couldn't lose something or get punished. And the sleepover was really cool.

[@johnmivule-novabow8143]

Be a good boy and you'll get a Cookie

[@Vincent-kl9jy]

Hi, PhD here: If you want replication studies published FUND THEM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[@TheYuvimon]

I just had to sit through an ad selling sugar pills to change a persons "quantum field" through placebo. This is SciShow for the love of god! :'(

[@robertkalinic335]

So the goal of the good behavior game is to condition kids to endure sitting 6 hours on their ass memorizing stuff they dont care about without complaining, does this seems like a good way to make them into independent adults?

[@stevecooper7883]

You and I both know public education was never designed for child welfare. It's just designed to keep public education going!

[@jerry3790]

You didn’t really go into much detail about why it is effective. Perhaps something to touch on in the future? Child psychology is pretty fascinating and useful

[@kevinwells9751]

@Don Gray It's not so much bribery as it is operant conditioning. The same way I taught my dog how to poop outside instead of on the carpet, how to play nicely with our cat, and how to sit on command. Yes, there is an element of control involved, but it also taught her how to behave in a way that is best for the pack and not just easiest for herself. Of course it doesn't solve all classroom problems like kids not understanding the material or bad teaching, but it solves the problem it is trying to address, namely distracting behavior and "acting up". I'm not sure where you get the idea that it stifles actual learning given that the studies found that they did better both on math and creative writing when they used this game. Can you cite a source on that?

[@medmom11]

My daughter's school uses Dojo. They award points for being on task, being kind, etc. and they can removed points for not listening or other rule breaking behavior. When each child individually earns 100 points they get to bring in a show and tell. When the whole class gets a compliment they get a prize of some kind, like maybe a pick from the treasure box. Also, each week a different child is chosen as the class helper, like holding doors and cleaning up with the teacher, and one child is chosen to be star student each week as well. The star student brings in a poster that tells about them, their favorite book to be read to the class by the teacher and their favorite toy. Everyone gets to be special for a week, and earn more spotlight time with good behavior.

[@hjpapow]

My 5th grade (1972-73) teacher used this method. It was very effective, but this is the first I'm hearing about it being an actual "method," with a name and studies behind it. I've never been in another class that was run this way. My teacher had many "tweaks" that kept it interesting throughout the school year, and I don't recall any serious, undue burdens put on the kids with behavior issues. That may say more about my teacher than the method, though, since she was a young woman- maybe 24 or 25ish- with a way of just caring about her students that felt genuine.

[@KingOfTheBeyond23]

It's basically Pavlov with extra steps.

[@horusbay]

I can imagine teachers with a bunch of towels to wipe the drooling from student's desks. Charming.

[@Fists91]

"How do we make people smarter?" "Let's teach them to beg for Scooby snacks!"

[@horusbay]

@@Fists91 well, they will be smart at that... At least!

[@Nyuum]

That sounds like slavery with extra steps...

[@zetsevs]

I can see one issue with it being the fact its using peer pressure as a mechanism which is also why it works but it might dispreportionally add stress to some children exspecially the ones who are acting out because there emotional from being isolated the whole snakes eat its own tail kinda deal where like for me if this was a thing id be that child whos sad and destroyed because no one likes me because I caused some trouble as kids naturally do so I just act out further making the distance further between me and my teammates in the class etc etc that said though if its affective use it just observant over it affect on the children social dynamic if its causing one child or a handful in perticular to be socialy isolated and that having a negative impact on them consider modifying it addressing the child directly or being more leniant on that perticular child

[@TreespeakerOfTheLand]

My teacher used this in primary school and it even held me (sort of ) in line , the child who would end up in the extra quiet class of the special ed primary school. Guess it works fine, seeing I am writing this from my university dorm... Edit: the teacher used this in the regular primary school

[@luciferangelica]

sounds better than my teacher picking me up by the neck

[@TreespeakerOfTheLand]

@@luciferangelica yeah, I'd say so. Sounds like they weren't the nicest people...

[@colineriksen278]

A slight rebuttal/addition: You stated towards the end of the video that the boys were disproportionately disruptive. This is due to what schools consider disruptive behavior. Since boys (in general) want more active behavior and sitting in a desk for seven hours isn’t active, they will tend to be more rowdy. I would suggest doing a study (and attempting to replicate it) on the results of having more active involvement from the students that has a large enough sample size to prove the hypothesis. (Yes I realize I’m being a bit hopeful right now but it could realistically be done)

[@EmmaDilemma039]

Thanks for making this video. My mom is a teacher!

[@GasGearsGames]

so basically its like a class room in japan?

[@songpoetry1]

If that's how classrooms in Japan work, then it makes me wonder about a possible correlation with Japan's bullying problem.

[@ericbartol]

I'm pretty sure there was always a version of this going on in my family, all the time. I know church time was a definite. After church, we'd head to the store for "candy day." You got an allotment minus deductions for bad or disruptive behavior.

[@nobbie01]

When I was in elementary school, my school adopted this system. It was a really small school (up to 6th grade, classrooms on average had about 10 students). I remember not really feeling very excited about it (like the video said, it benefited mainly the disruptive students, which I wasn't), unfortunately we moved to a different city not long after that so I don't really know how well it did with student behaviour improvement.

[@Luchoedge]

Isn't there any bad consequences if a team consistently loses the game, and then loses interest in trying to win altogether? What if the classroom wasn't divided in teams, rather work as a whole team to meet a quota or something? I might have to go read the studies.

[@kittycat7471]

And what if there's a really quiet person who tries their best to behave but the rest of their team doesn't care and that child has to take on the consequences even though they were doing everything right.

[@DrD0000M]

Mix up the teams every few weeks.

[@Siphonife]

Easy change the teams regularly.

[@greyareaRK1]

This doesn't mean women are disadvantaged. Arguably they also benefit long-term from having more socially oriented males. For the 'flouride in the water/vital essence' crowd, aggressive boys were also happier long-term, and just as able to skin a deer or change a car's motor oil.

[@beth8775]

Girls are absolutely benefited when boys are more socially concious. Less disruption = less stress = better learning.

[@charlieangkor8649]

I played the "stop working as a teacher and change job" with the kids. It was amazing. Disruptive behavior of kids dropped to zero.

[@infinitecanadian]

There was once a short documentary done when I was in the Royal Canadian Air Cadets. They filmed us in a class, intently watching our instructor. It was never like that.

[@tinamcginnis9600]

This very interesting but in the school I work we do not play the good behavior game or operant conditioning because our students are not rats. Our students are human being s who need to learn how to resolve conflict, how to get their needs met in a healthy. It is more complicated than that if you are interested try positive discipline by Jane Nelson.

[@itsOnlyOlivia]

My kindergarten teacher did this, whoever was the the best behaved and followed all the body basics (folded hands, sitting still, listening, watching, etc) got to have Courteous Clifford (a stuffed Clifford toy) sit at their desk for the period.

[@timgchannel3328]

Good job! You get a gold star and a pumpkin sticker.

[@sdfkjgh]

Aww, but the banana stickers are where all the REAL praise comes from... kzbin.info/www/bejne/rKnbgoZrga-cb9k

[@lakrids-pibe]

You get an upvote

[@Hitogata]

Even if this has a positive impact on trouble making boys, rewards and punishments just don't work in the long run! Please read Punished by Rewards by Alfie Kohn. It's really mind blowing!

[@joaovitormatos8147]

"Which has been published in 1969" Me: nice

[@suzanneglover3146]

I get the science but I can’t get past the idea that kids might get bullied if the have problems. Ya know like what Private Pyle experience in “Full Metal Jacket.” Maybe that’s a different situation though because the behavior in the movie is failure to keep up pretty much not fixing disruptive behavior. 🤔

[@heidielliott4396]

If they played this in my elementary school I would ruin it every day and everyone would be even more annoyed with me.

[@eleahflockhart]

My entire k-2 school used a version of this that worked very well, every time a student did something "good" they were allowed to put a small eraser heart in the class "heart jar" and everytime a student did something "bad" they had to take a heart out of the jar, when the jar was full, the whole class got an extra recess. This seemed to work very well, likely because the whole class worked together. However, my 1st and 2nd grade teacher did a version of this that seemed to work rather badly, i'm not sure if this was due to the design or the teacher, but in her version individual students lost tokens for bad behavior, the students who still had their tokens were given a prize at the end of the week, however, the only students who ever seemed to lose their tokens were students who would later be diagnosed with some form of autism, adhd, or other mental diagnoses correlated with "acting out" in some way. Those that did not retain their tokens were teased and looked down upon by the other students, which largely led to already socially isolated students becoming further ostracized. However, students never seemed to lose tokens for behaviors that hurt other students, but didn't affect the teacher, such as bullying, stealing, or shoving other students.

[@Victoria-dh9vb]

I had a teacher that did something similar. At the front of the class we had two buckets. One empty, and one full of marbles. If we were good we could gain marbles in the one bucket, and if we were bad the teacher would start putting marbles in the bad bucket. If we managed to get all of the marbles over into the good bucket by the end of the week we got a reward. The caveat being that we would have to keep the marbles in the good bucket till Friday. I have to say, it worked really well. The teacher rarely had to raise her voice, she would just start dropping marbles loudly into the bad bucket, and the panicked shushing would spread like wildfire across the class.

[@SagaciousEagle]

Some people display good behaviour naturally as a kid and teens, but shifted to showing more aggression as they grow older into working life. One does not need to be aggressive when all the desires and needs are being fulfilled.

[@mikeg9b]

5:57 This makes me mad. I was a failed teacher. My 3-1/2 years of teaching were an exhausting and demoralizing time in my life. Maybe I wasn't trying hard enough, but I place a lot of the blame on poor teacher preparation in college. I don't remember any mention of the good behavior game and I think it would have benefited me greatly. I was highly proficient in my subject (music), but I was deficient in classroom management. After flaming out as a teacher, I joined the Army and retired 20 years later with military retirement pay (so it worked out in the end).

[@fish3977]

Foucault is shaking their head in grave

[@natanoj16]

I just started as a teacher and watched this video when it came out. I didn't think more about it. A few days ago I was standing with one of my 1grade classes and some students were acting up and I drew a circle with some areas on the board (think trivial pursuit wheels) and filled one of them. I told the class: 'every time you do something bad or don't do what you have to I will give you a' clock' and a tick. If you fill it out I will write home to your parents. BUT every time you do something really good I will remove a tick again and add a tick to the good clock that unlocks a surprise. Then the next day I realized that I basically used 'The good behavior game' xD

[@tinaharildstad4679]

I remember my teacher did something similar. She would give the class smileyfaces for behaving, and if we reached a certain number we got to leave school earlyer, or some other reward.

[@ourladyofdarkness2622]

could have used this about 5 years ago when I tried to become a teacher. Classroom behaviour was a huge problem at the schools I did my placements at and I was turned off from teaching all together

[@theMoporter]

We had this in our class without being split into groups, we were just one whole group (the class).

[@WillHsuMusic]

Hmm...I’m hearing similar things a LOT right now. I’m gonna try this stuff with my classes. Thanks for the video!

[@asho4821]

IRL, you don't always need to follow the rules. It's actually very profitable (to some extent) to break them and take risks. Most importantly, in real life you have to withstand hate and disapproval from some people, not letting them stop you. That's what the good behavior game doesn't teach you. Furthermore, it discourages you from that type of behavior

[@pencilfriendpaperscribbler6032]

ASHO Yes, okay, that’s fine, but in a classroom where there is a common goal, to learn, it genuinely isn’t helpful if people are continually asserting their individuality for no specific purpose other than self-gratification. The children who are going to become doctors need to acquire many academic skills. We would prefer that our doctors are knowledgeable, wouldn’t we, rather than just consumed with the desire to express their 'personality?' In order for the foundation of their education to be strong, they have to be able to focus in the classroom and acquire the skills they need. The child who disrupts all of the other students takes this opportunity away from them. Of course some students have disabilities and need extra support. But those who don’t aren’t harmed by learning to be considerate of others. That is also a skill which is necessary.

[@asho4821]

@@pencilfriendpaperscribbler6032 I agree with you. Though I think that the older children get, the less manipulation should be applied to them. And they must somehow, in schoolyears, learn to be more self-minded as they approach graduation

[@pencilfriendpaperscribbler6032]

ASHO Very true. Both of mine refused any help with their homework once they were past primary school as they preferred to bring their scores to me afterwards, and have full credit for themselves. But they were both capable and went on to good universities, even though one has Aspergers. It would have been different if they had struggled, there's no shame in that, or there shouldn’t be.

[@adeebmd5701]

As a student i felt that being used some of my trips , assemblies , classes and having the students hate one another and im like just standing there quietly why the heck am in this river the bad people are like fighting each other and im like what the heck its no use having that infinite chain reaction but only works if they tire us out such as 20 rounds around the building more² in the morning with light rains like a boot camp The people who makes the Ruckus made us late for recess cuz their friends are in class and dosent seem to value recess only when its really necessary and im stuck in that eternal flow but gud thing ive built some resistance seeing people fail before my eyes and say die internally u have brought this on us all you un empathetic person , ill starve with you , soak with you , dry with you ,sweat with you till you get the point of the game