Who wouldn’t want a jar of good deeds noticed, to constantly remind us of how awesome we are everyday?  I would.

The cool thing about what we simply call “the marble jar” is this – it changes with your kids!   This is something we’ve been doing with our kids for years and it still gets the attention of the oldest who is now 13.  It’s easy to implement, very effective and really builds positive behavior.

First things first, here is what you will need:

1. One clear acrylic container per child (preferably with a lid)

2. Lots of marbles – more than one color is good but not neccessary

3. One large clear marble container – a bowl or canister

THAT’S IT!!!!!

Secondly, here are the guidelines:

The kids begin accumulating marbles for their good deeds.  We have always given them for deeds that were spontaneous and things the kids had not been instructed to do or say.  Here are a couple of examples:

My son shared his snack at the pool with his younger sister who forgot hers at home.  He really wanted his snack and had mentioned how hungry he was but shared it anyway.  I noticed his generosity and told him he gets marbles to put in his jar when he gets home.  In this case it was two marbles but you can tailor it to fit your style.  (I didn’t even have to remind him to get the marbles when we got home… he went straight to it)

I occasionally ask my 13 yr old to clean out/up her closet because it has the tendency to be her place to stuff, cram, throw, stack and store anything and everything.  I usually have to ask 2 or 3 times before she kinda “gets around to it.” She recently said, “Sure Mom” to a closet cleaning request and to my surprise, went straight up and took care of business!  For her that was monumental so she got 3 marbles… and when I said she got 3 marbles she was proud as peacock with her 3 little marbles!

He Who Giveth Can Taketh Away! If someone says or does something nasty, ugly, vile or vicious.  Or simply doesn’t do what they’re asked in some obviously disrespectful way – then they are coughing up marbles and oooooeey they don’t like to give those marbles back!

We assigned a value of approximately 33 cents to each marble and cash them in at the end of the week or two weeks – whatever works.  What makes the marbles magic for us as parents is how they take on the friction of the difficult situations instead of every issue being the Kids vs. Us.

This works like magic… our kids still get all wide eyed and perky when we utter those esteem building words, “Go get some marbles.”  It’s so incredibly important that we noticed the good deed done!  Soon you will notice they are looking for ways to earn marbles - positively marble-ous!

p.s. kids like to see their marbles piling up in the container which is why it’s really important that it’s clear!!

Here is an example of what I mean:

At the pool today, I gave all 3 of my kids a very direct expectation that when 7:30 came,  I would signal them to get out of the pool to dry off and get ready to go home.  Two of the three were messing around and jumped back in the pool a couple of  times but the third child stayed out of the pool from the moment I waived the signal and walked over to me to dry off and go home (surprisingly, not the one I would have guessed).  That child was told he would get an extra scoop of ice cream for dessert while the other two got the normal allotment.  The two non-compliant kids looked at me with perplexity because they weren’t really being punished but they didn’t get the reward either.  They could not really complain or protest because of the obviousness of their lack of concern for the respectfully and clearly laid-out request.  I have to admit, I was feeling pretty clever!

Victorious!