Before: the room is always loud, I am trying to teach a difficult, new skill to my group of active little preteens, and I spend half the time redirecting my group (sit down, pay attention, get started, participate…). Ugh – I am sick of my own voice. Plus I’m sick of hearing all my paras do the same in their groups.
Fast forward a few weeks and one flipping awesome token economy later –
After: we get started on our new lesson, the room is significantly quieter, when students’ attention start to drift, I quietly pass a small green paper to one student and the other heads literally whip to attention. One student offers to fill my water bottle for me. Another compliments my great choice in noun vs. verb activity. My one student who used to be the sloooowest worker ever – I now barely have enough work to keep busy. Seriously – this is no exaggeration. I wouldn’t do that to you. My students are obsessed. It is like magic wand of awesomeness.
Check out some Token Eonkcomy Setup Tips:
I love setting up a reinforced menu that you can change! Add items, remove items, make items more expensive or cheaper as needed. This system is all about flexibility!
My product on TpT – Token Economy Setup Kit will guide you through setting up a classroom token economy in an easy to implement step by step way. This product includes editable labels for storing tokens or points, baseline data sheet, direct rules for earning/losing points, visual token economy rules, and display for reinforcers available for purchase. All resources are included in both PDF & powerpoint versions. So all pages are editable and can be easily adapted to add your students’ names or specific behaviors your classroom is working on This packet includes detailed instructions including photos on how to set this up effectively.
The start of the year is crazy busy. It’s so important to teach our students to engage in positive behaviors, set clear expectations, and have consequences (both positive and negative) in place!
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5 Responses
I bought this product over the summer and have implemented the token economy system the way you outlined and so far the kids LOVE it! And my class is tk-2, so it even works with the younger ones. I love the flexibility of the system as well!
SO great to hear! This comment really made my day! Happy you and your students liked this!
Yeah!! So excited to read this tonight!! Another sp-Ed coordinator told me nothing is free in her classroom…or her home 😉 and encouraged me to do the same by using tokens or stickers! So, I will be getting this asap!!
How often do your kids get to shop? I feel like I have two many different things going on at once right now. Three kids have their own charts, a group one and then a punch card for everyone. It is so confusing at times. I need to have one system. What happens if students ask for a ticket? Do you take any away?
Yea I like to keep it as simple as possible or else I get too confused lol! We usually shop every few days. That took a bit to get to. When we stated the system we shopped at the end of morning instruction and at the end of the day. Then we gradually lengthened the time to once a day and then to every few days. I made the items gradually more expensive which once that happens they can’t shop as often. Plus it increases the motivation to earn more points! Some kids may need to shop more often and contact reinforcement so some individualization on the “how often to shop” can be helpful. Good luck!