Ep 007: Is Your School Getting Rewards Right?

Let's cast our minds back to when we were in school, what rewards, awards, etc. do you remember getting? Do you remember, did you have like award ceremonies and things like that? We had, I think when I started in year seven, we had something called commendations. So if we, did you have something like that? So if you absolutely smashed like a particular piece of work, for example, or you'd consistently put in loads of effort across like a half term, the teacher would write, it was like a green coloured certificate because I remember used to line my bedroom wall with them next to all my favourite like 90s boy band pin-ups, but that's another story. But that's so commendations is something apart from that. Oh, I got some booktoken, so some of my GCSE results were there, I was like this very big award ceremony. Booktoken. Yes, but I couldn't tell you what sort of which books I actually redeemed them for. So that's actually probably not a very good story. Okay, honestly, okay, yeah, that wasn't the best story. But honestly, everything you've just said there, memories have just come flooding back. So we had commendations. I don't remember what happened with the commendations, but I do remember getting book vouchers and booktokens and we used to get these paper booktokens if you did particularly well in exams or in particular in any subject. But I found some booktokens that I got from when I was in secondary school and I haven't spent them. Are you serious? I've literally got them in my bag right now. I feel like you're just making this part. No, no genuinely. So I found them in my drawer a few months ago and I thought, oh my gosh, I haven't spent these yet. But they're those physical paper booktokens. They're not even like, do you know these days you get the little card? No, you need like the old school paper. And I found them and I thought, oh my gosh, I need to actually use these because clearly I've just put them away and like treasured them and I just forgot about them. So I've literally, it's like taking them out of a time capsule. I've got them in my bag. I actually put them in because I thought next time I'm out and about, but I keep forgetting to use them. Okay, try and find them, but also like what's the point because they must have expired by now? Okay, let me see. I've got to look. This is literally them. Have a look. Oh, this is so old school. I love it. But there's, I think booktokens are notorious, not notorious. That's the wrong word famous for they don't expire. They literally don't have an expiry date. Is it true? But look, the bookshop they've been issued from doesn't even exist anymore because it shut down like five, I think 10 years ago maybe. That's sad. So these are very old, let's just say, but they look like they're brand new because they were just sat at the back of my drawer. I've just seen it says on the terms and conditions of the back there is no time limit for the exchange of national booktokens. Yes. Even if they're like 50 years old. 50. Just had to get a bit of a dig in there. Shall I just keep them and like give them on to the next generation and see what happened? I'll learn a few things. No, just go to a bookshop and buy us like a good summer holiday read for yourself. That is literally what I shall do. Yeah. All right. You just wanted a bit of validation. I was always what you were going to do. You just wanted me to reaffirm that on air. That what I was going to go and buy and spend that book finally. As if you were going to give it and give them to anyone else. I'm a generous guy. Yeah, okay. Yeah. Welcome back to another episode of Operation Education. I'm Protesh Raichura. I'm Nina Sharma. Speaking of rewards. Our scenario from last week was about whether schools should get pupils to swap points they earn in their lessons and out of lessons for material things like pens, what other things like chocolates or sweets or other prized possession items like vouchers and things like that. So there's a kind of it's interesting isn't it because they are all physical material goods. Do you think it's a good idea to give pupils the option of swapping them? Will that increase by in motivation and transform culture in schools? I have loads of conversations with this actually with teachers and school leaders. I think the first thing is to go back to the praise point achievement point on merit in itself and the awarding of that. So just as kind of just reminding ourselves of how to make sure that we're maximising kids motivation is yes it's really important to give that kind of reward and praise but it's really all about the delivery of it and ensuring it's all that warm specific named praise right so that's kind of like the prerequisite in order for it to land really well. So the contrast of that would be if teachers are saying yeah there's a point for you or if a kid does think well here take five points good stuff and that's it that's not going to be as effective as savoring the moment when you award the praise point in the first place with achievement point whatever we're calling it. Exactly because that first non-example you've demonstrated it's almost like a checklist that they're ticking off or I've given that praise point and when something is like that if you're just doing it like a checklist then the kids just check out. So absolutely as you said I need like that one. I've been saving that up for a while if there was no relevant point I would have just chucked that in route. Months in the planning that one was. Literally so we've kind of established that so that was just a quick like reminder recap so yes you're awarding that point you're delivering it in that warm specific named praise and then so the question is well actually sorry to drop there but it's also when you're giving it is it actually earned or is it just given out very liberally just because you know all you look have another praise point and a while here's one or even things like oh do you know what everyone's been working pretty well let's give all of you a praise point that I think it seems like everyone is going to be loving their lives but we've talked before about group praise versus individual named praise so I think that's another prerequisite perhaps yeah no absolutely this idea about you know you have to rise to my standards in order to really deserve it and exactly as you said individual praise rather than that collective praise yes a good reminder so before schools think about what they do once the pupils have been awarded the praise you have to get those fundamentals right first because doesn't matter what the rewards and the prizes are afterwards if the delivery of the the individual praise points isn't done well in the first place you just missing out it's like a opportunity lost that is there for you to save and make the most of and really build and secure really high winning hearts buy in from the pupils in your school exactly so then let's imagine that we've nailed that so we are giving out we're awarding kids those points and delivering that warmed specific named praise and doing that super well in a super well in a way that motivates the kids so then the question is is it necessary to take it to the next level what are your thoughts on this yeah so I think even just before answering that straight away in an earlier episode we talked about tick sheets and how even if you don't even have the points the reason that giving the prey giving ticks without any points is powerful in and of itself because it's not the points that is the most powerful thing there it's the it's the named praise it's the warmth which with with which you give it and it is the connection you build with that individual named pupil and then feeling recognized seen with that concrete thing that's reinforced that is the culture building moment so if a school isn't doing that and they're focusing on the points rather than the the delivery of the praise you it's it's almost like it has become like you say a checkbox thing it's like a surface level thing so I think first thing I'd say when to schools is is the what is your priority the priority and the goal ultimately isn't let's get a point system working the goal is how do we get culture in the school stronger so that's your starting point and so it's that lens through which I would analyze the next question which is what do you do with those points and I think there's two avenues that I see schools go down one is you swap the praise points a bit like a it's almost like a currency and you can trade your points that you get that you've earned and through your hard work by living the values of your school whatever that might be for something physical material like a pen like a rubber some other stationary sweets, chocolates, lollipops or potentially even entering into prize draws to earn like bigger rewards like games or games consoles bikes I've seen all sorts I remember when I was at school used to be entered into power. tries draws for gadgets like at the back in the day like MP3 players or iPod shuffle or whatever it was. Or the other option is you don't actually swap your points for anything. If you earn a certain number of points, depending on the number of points you might get a special mention, you might get a badge that you can wear that shows that signals how many points you got or a certificate or something that reinforces that this deserves recognition, but without actually giving the kid anything material that they keep and use that is their own, and certainly not something that they've traded and swapped like a currency. When you hear that distinction, which do you gravitate towards and why? I mean certainly towards the second one, but one of the examples you gave is a badge, not necessarily a material word, but it's still quite physical. Why is that different from a pen or a bar of chocolate? I think a badge is different and I put that in the second category and not the first, because an individual pupil doesn't, first of all, they haven't traded anything for it, it's been earned, so that's like the first thing, it's like a threshold award. But second of all, it's something that you wear as part of your school uniform, so you might wear it on your bag or your lapel, whatever your uniform might be, and it then becomes a talking point. Say if I'm a teacher who doesn't necessarily in that, in the year group of that particular pupil, but I teach them, and I see that they come into school the next day after the, you know, a particular period of time when these badges are handed out, let's say end of term reward assembly or something of that sort, and I see they've got a silver badge, I can go, ah, Nina, is that a silver badge that I see on you? Whoa, what does that mean? How many point praise points did you get last term? What, what have you been doing in your own in my lessons? You've been fantastic, but what does that tell me? That tells me you've been good in maths, you've been brilliant in science, tell me, what have you done to earn this? And suddenly, you are reminding it as the pupil of all the great things that you have achieved, all the times that you were given those praise points, and you've got someone else who previously hadn't necessarily awarded you all of those points, feeling proud of you for earning those points. What is that now doing to your motivation? How do you, how do you feel, you know, when I was describing that? Feeling so good right now. Why? My motivation is sky high and through the roof, because I just feel warm and fuzzy inside through all of that. As you said, it's like that conversation. So, I think first it's an emblem and it's kind of, it's a physical symbol that represents an embodies what that child has done to deserve it. Then as you said, it's a conversation starter and the effect of that is, it's just kind of reinforcing the great work and effort that that kid has done as well. And it just continues as sort of, I guess, virtuous cycle, right? Yes. And what would imagine instead of the silver badge, you had gone up to a school shop and traded it for a £10 high street voucher. And then you went and you bought yourself something like a game. Why would that, how would that feel and would that feel different if you were a pupil? I mean, it might be in terms of that instant gratification, it feels quite good, but it doesn't have like a long-lasting positive effect on me or impact on my long-term motivation either. I would say it's kind of like then all done and dusted. And I just feel it really, just if it, just the kids are then focusing on, it's like the end outcome is them receiving this material or physical reward, they're not kind of really spending time in focusing on that visceral feeling that you get when a) the praise is delivered in the right way and b) you get that right sort of recognition through that badge or an award ceremony and a public celebration, I think. It just really devalues the praise in the first place. And I will just keep expecting, okay, I've got this many points, right? Okay, I'm entitled to this pen. Oh, I want this voucher for whatever as well, I think. So it is creating the wrong kind of culture, reinforcing the wrong kind of culture, one of I'm expecting, what else am I going to get rather than it becoming a, I guess it's creating those kind of emblems, as you said. And also the awarding of the emblem, that the who gets a silver badge, it's this list of pupils come up and celebrate. And then who's going to get the gold badge? Like it's, it create, it reinforces all the behaviors that got them that let them to earning that particular emblem in the first place, which I think is really powerful and it allows that public celebration without detracting from the original reasons that that emblem was earned. So you're reinforcing hard work. People who are getting this award have got it because they've worked hard, they've shown kindness, whatever the values of the school are that reflects those. And I think it's much easier to do that around a kind of something that isn't material that's not tradable, it's not, it's not, it's not, it's got certain amount of value and that's it. It's not just a pen or a five pound voucher, it is a badge that honor and the pride and the joy associated with that. It's not tradable, it's, it is in and of itself worthy and earned and deserved. Exactly, in and of itself. And I love this idea about using all these ways to reinforce the original desirable behaviors that led to that praise and reward being delivered because pens run out and you can scoff a piece of chocolate in a few seconds. But what is so long lasting and therefore more meaningful with rewarding kids and the other way that we've suggested, it's the emotional feel, it's that visceral feeling that you get when you are acknowledged and recognized and celebrated in much deeper and less superficial ways, I think. And fundamentally, kids value what we value. You say if we are united as like a staff team and we make really big show and dance of showcasing the kids who really deserve this type of accolade, then that in itself is going to drive them and motivate them to want to replicate those same desirable behaviors. So they receive the same reaction and response from their teachers. Yeah. That is just so well put. And it's just making me think that the two scenarios that are in one scenario, let's say a kid is getting a £10 voucher. In the future or other pupils seeing that pupil being awarded their thinking, I want a £10 voucher or I'm luck, yes, I got the £10 voucher. But with a badge or a certificate, the kids aren't buzzing about the certificate itself or the badge itself. They're actually buzzing that it's the teacher recognised me for this and I can now take this and show my parents and they will recognise me and my hard work for this. So what's motivating one pupil is I want £10 rather than I want to earn the admiration of my teachers because these are the people I respect and if I have their admiration back then that's a really great thing or my parents, I want to make my parents proud. Is it easier to do that with a £10 voucher or is it easier to do that with a certificate or a talking point, a badge? I think there's a difference between the two, isn't there? For sure. Are we just being party pupils though? Not giving kids chocolates and sweet treats and lollipops and lots of just, you know, prizes and all that. And cavities. And cavities and lots of dentists and all the dentist appointments for life. Yeah, I think, look, I don't think there's the occasional sweet treat. I think might be fine. Like I'm not saying never give them any sweets or treats or anything like that. But if you can give, the admiration is worth far more. Like kids will get sweets and treats. You know, they get that when they have, you know, and the canteen, they'll get that. But will they get a recognition admiration? Which one has more value in my mind based on what you said as well? You can scoff down that chocolate in a few seconds. The thing that's going to give them long lasting joy. Like if I think back to my school days, you know, I still remember the award ceremonies, the standing up that your name is announced or, you know, teachers would, you know, with the commendations that you said, I think they would sign them in your diary. It's just all coming back to me because I'm actually thought the word commendation in a while because it's, that's kind of. I've gone out of fashion, isn't it, a little bit? But then you'd have that in your diary, or if you've got a certain number of commendations, you'd get a letter home signed by the head teacher. And that would come through in the post. I know these days it's all done by email, but the post would come and you'd see it's from the school and you're like, oh, I hope this is good from the school and then your parents would open it. And you'd be like, wow, the head teacher's written with this, look, they've signed in your names and you've got three commendations or whatever it is. Like that doesn't compare to, I'm sure there's loads of times I've got chocolates, but there's no one time I remember where I've got the chocolate. Like nothing springs to mind, but I can remember the letters, I remember these to be postcards that were posted home and you would get the postcard through and you'd read it, it would come through the postbox and you'd read it straight away and you'd think, oh, wow, I've got a postcard from my teacher. Like I actually remember those moments of watching the post come through or you see it in the pile. Whereas I don't necessarily remember a random chocolate that I might have received and. - Yeah, I think that's a good point. And actually it is, it's probably easier, isn't it, to have a system way of converting these praise points into more sort of monetary or physical objects, isn't it? As opposed to being able to really upskill all teachers so that they're confident to deliver the praise point in the first place in a way that is so impactful and powerful for the kids and being in a work in a school where all teachers are able to not just treat this as that check box, but actually something that just adds so much value in and of itself. Like that's a, we know that's the ideal but we also know we're realistic, that's not easy, right? And we talk about consistency, it's not really enough for a math teacher to be renowned at a school at doing that super well but actually the science department aren't that great at it. Like that is also going to have an impact on that student's motivation. So it's, I can see how it's easier and more straightforward as a simple solution. Let's just kind of, let's just chuck a money at a problem really. - Yes, that reminds me of a blog post that I read a while back by Ruth Ashby. I don't know if you've come across this. I can't remember the exact name, it's something like pointable things and she talks in it about how leaders often will, I think this is the gist of the blog, I might be misquoting or remembering but how leaders can sometimes kind of do things because they're easy to point to and say, look, we're doing something to solve a particular problem but actually, whilst we can tick it off and point it and go, look, we're doing this, we're doing this, we're not actually measuring whether it's having impact or whether it's actually working and that kind of links to what you're saying which is what's gonna, you can easily, as a leader go, yes, well we have points and we have a lot, some kids got hundreds of points and some kids didn't and some, the kids who got all these points, we have a system where they get all these rewards but actually, that's the easy bit, it's easy to implement that in one sense but is it actually changing culture on the ground? Are the kids more bought in at your school after the rewards or compared to before or to compare to another school down the road that's not using that reward system? And one of the pitfalls of this actually that I've noticed in some schools that I've visited or worked in is teachers will often notice this and we'll mention it to me but if the teachers are noticing it, the pupils definitely are, is often the pupils who misbehaved the most that end up with the most rewards because teachers resort to noticing and placating the kids that might be shouting out the most and when they just about manage not to shout out or whatever it might be that the behavior that's not the one that the cultural norm the teachers want to establish, those pupils get over praised because they met those basic expectations that some of the quieter, hardworking people have been meeting all year and just have not been recognizable and that plays nicely back to our earlier episode that we talked about using your tick sheets to see who has not yet got that praise. Let's seek them out and notice what they're doing and I think so that's why there's the big interplay between all of these factors as well and if it means that you end up with all the kids whose behavior isn't necessarily the best, getting the best prizes, not only are you inadvertently undermining the culture that you want but the kids who are doing well but not being as recognized, you're causing them to lose buy-in from the school which is having the opposite effect of what you want. - Yeah, so it's almost like shifting your focus from prioritising all of these points, what shall we convert them into and actually rather than doing that, focusing on, you know what, let's deliver praise, I've said it several times, I'll say it again, in that warm, precise, named way and great reminder about the tick lists as well and using them as like, I think the phrase you used last time as a heat map of the lesson that then supports you to narrate the story of the lesson at the end and if you can put all your resources, your time, your effort and energy into ensuring that all teachers are consistently using these particular strategies, then I think it'll be very interesting to see that the impact that has in terms of positive behavioural change and habit formation for kids and classroom and whole school culture as well and thinking, oh, is it really necessary now to convert these pens into a 50 pound Amazon voucher? Are that online retailers also available? - Yeah, fantastic. And an unintended, well, a side effect of this kind of decision making will be, you could save tons of money at your school. - Yeah. - Like if you think about the number of vouchers. - It's like maybe higher and extra like English teacher rather than spend it on, you know, thousands of lollipops or whatever it might be. - Yeah, quite so. - And if you can just pass on some of those savings to me, that'll be great. - Oh yeah, I'm not going to turn that down. - No, but it's true, I think, you know, when you think about, like, take the exercise of adding up all the monetary rewards that are given out in this way and just invest 5% of that into some badges and certificates and use the rest of the money to hire next, like, potentially, I, whatever it might be, to do something that's higher impact. - What a great tip, we've just shared with schools. - Yes, we should write this down. - Absolutely. Okay, so we've thought about rewards. We've thought about the option of having, kind of, swapping them for monetary stuff and then at versus having these emblems. Just a final quick question. Where might not be that quick, but in terms of awarding these, how, what's the good frequency that you might refer back to points that pupils get? Is it, would you be doing this every day? Every week, every month, every half term? What kind of thing? Or is it different things you do at different frequencies? - Yeah, I think that's a really good question and I think a lot of that will depend on the current systems that exist in your school and the structure and format of your school day. So for example, I think at different frequencies is great to starting on a daily basis. So if you have a form tutor system, then celebrating the number of points that the top students in your top tutes in your form group have achieved at the end of that day and having that positive celebration, I think is really lovely. If you have lineups at your school or greetings, that gives you an opportunity, that punctuate the school day. That's another good opportunity to give that public shout out as well in front of the year group. A lot of schools have weekly assemblies, but I like the idea of sort of the constant reinforcement. So building and culminating in something such as a big end-of-term reward of celebration assembly that really recognizes the kids who have been the most consistent in earning the highest number of points as well. I think that's really, really motivating. - Brilliant. And if it is the case that when leaders look or even a teacher looks at the number of points and they think, oh, it's really all the pupils who's often misbehaved the most, that seem to have the most points. What advice or suggestions might you give teachers that noticed that in their own logging of data and what might advice might you give to leaders for kind of tackling that? - Yeah, I think it's really useful to have to sort of to be monitoring this and form tutors will have access to that data where they're narrating those positives. But leaders in particular, I think having an overview and an oversight of the individual teachers in your department and how, I think a lot of it goes back to kind of tick lists. I've done this myself earlier on in my career, exactly as you said to placate students who tend to be not the best behaved, but you're so relieved. And you do feel a sense of pride, or okay, they've managed to meet this particular expectation, but then if you're disproportionately rewarding them above the other kids just because they're quiet. but they do the right thing all the time and obviously that's very problematic. So I think everyone needs to have responsibility and take ownership over how they are praising and rewarding these kids. So every individual classroom teacher but heads of department leaders need to have oversight over what's happening in those different areas as well, I would say. Yeah, that data speaks to a training need and school that their leaders can address. To wrap up this episode then, first of all we looked at praise and reward culture in schools as a whole. And we discussed how the most important thing to get right first is how our teachers giving praise in lessons and around the school. Are they delivering it warmly or are they not? Are they actually giving it only when it's earned or are they giving it as a way to placate pupils that might be more likely to misbehave than this neglect some of the quieter pupils. But once those are in place we've discussed different options that schools have in terms of well what do you do with the kind of points that have been accumulated by pupils over time? And we looked at the pros and cons of having those points act as a currency exchanged for material goods like sweets, rewards, vouchers, versus having threshold values for each number of points earned and earning things like emblems that represent the hard work and success of those pupils, whether that's badges, whether that's certificates, whether that's recognition and mentions and assemblies. And I think this will prompt so much discussion amongst leaders and if you are a school leader or teacher that has found any of these ideas helpful for discussions and decisions that are to be made, do get in touch, drop us an email, [email protected]. We'd love to hear your reflections on that journey. One thing that we haven't touched on this episode that I'd love to return to in a future episode is the idea of intrinsic versus extrinsic motivation. So if that's something you're interested in hearing do let me know. Nina, can you present us with the scenario for listeners to think about over the next week? You've created the new seating plans for all of your new classes using the relevant criteria. The kids have approached the threshold of your classroom ready for their first lesson with you that term. How do you physically ensure that you're moving them from there to be sat in their correct seats? Do you have the seating plan up on the board and get the kids to find their own seats or are there alternative options? Hint, hint, there are definitely alternative options. Oh, I bet there's a lot of teachers that are curious about that as I've often seen the former that you've just described. Next time on Operation Education. If you would like to share your answers to the scenario/question or even want to suggest topic for a future episode of Operation Education, then get in touch email me on [email protected]. If your school would like a high quality CPD, then get in touch with me via bunsonblue.com/cpp. Operation Education is a Bunsen Blue production.