Parenting- money for good grades?

An acquaintance has her 4 youngest kids with her (she has an older son who's living on his own). A 12-year-old, a 13-year-old, a 15-year-old, and a 17-year-old. For each A they get on their report cards they get $20 and for each B they get $10.
Do you think money is a good reward for good grades? If yes, why? If not, what is a good reward? Do you think there should be a reward at all?

I don't think its something I'd do, I'd prefer to give days out or activities as a reward, but I know when I was a teen, I'd definitely have worked harder if I knew there was money at the end of it.

I got money for good grades. But not per grade. It was all A's or nothing. I got $20 for all As. I would not pay per grade so that they might get an A in one class and a C in another yet still get money. And definitely not THAT much money.

My parents also didn't want me to have a job outside of school to earn money, because they wanted me to focus on getting good grades in school, which in turn got me scholarships for college.

no , because each child's learning capabilities are different.

all would happen would frustrate the kids who have a difficult time as it is and make the ones whom learn easier to fly through there work and lord it over the other ones.

of course if i only had 1 kid then maybe , but with this group it is not fair. or even right.

We got money for good grades. It was started to try and persuade my sister to work harder for better grades, and to be fair they had to give me money too

We did get money for grades, but it wasn't based on the number of A's. It was based on previous report cards and if there was improvement. I have 3 siblings and my brothers, no matter how they tried, never got A's and I was getting all A's all the time. So to be fair, it was based on improving and the money was always fair but not excessive.

We got paid, but it was like $5 for an A, $3 for a B, yelled at for Cs, and beaten for Ds, and disowned for Fs. (Okay the last three may be an exaggeration).

I think the incentive idea is nice, whether it be money, gift, or a trip of some sort. Even for kids that may be "troublemakers" or have difficulties in school, there's always something that can be worked on that they may get a reward.

Never got paid for grades, knew people that did. I don't think I would though. I don't even care that much about grades. All this has turned into is learn this material to get this letter on this test, then get this letter for this class then it will get you this for college and they come out not knowing ****.

Learning how to learn is much more than putting it down on paper for a test. Learning how to think and work hard at things is much more important than some grade. And no, I don't think the two go hand in hand.

I don't think I'd pay my kid for grades (at least not PER grade), but I'd do something special to celebrate their good report cards. Maybe go to their favorite restaurant and do something else fun and special. To me, celebrating the success of a finished semester or quarter shows more than handing a child $48 for their assortment of As and Bs. I don't like the idea of "paying" kids to do well in school. Do well in school because you want to do well, and there will be something to celebrate when the report card comes out.

My parents would give me money for a good report card (I always had As and Bs)... it was usually about $50 and of course I liked getting it lol. I did well in school anyway- they didn't have to use money to motivate me.

I've always thought it was silly when parents paid for each A and B, to be honest.

I got money for grades when I was younger (this subsided by the time I went to highschool/waldorf school, as they don't get grades).

I didn't get THAT much though. I got $2 of an A and $1 for a B.

I totally agree. How rare is that on Fire Hydrant?

I don't find it offensive, really, but it wouldn't work for all families and IMO could cause issues.

It wouldn't have worked in my family, based on the kids' different personalities. I don't think it would've changed the way we approached school, and would've caused tensions because the Classic Overachiever (me) would've gotten money for doing what she was going to do anyway. And we all have the same intelligence level/capabilities.

Plus, what happens when these kids go to college? Have careers?

But, again, I know that parents struggle to get their kids to do their schoolwork/study/care about their grades. If it works for them, great.

Some kids do better with that type of motivation. And in the real world you do get paid for a good job,a raise for an improvement, so why not. My dad would take me out and get me cds or rollerblades or something when I was in middle school.

My answer is that it depends on the kid. For my nephew it made the entire difference from being a C- student and being an B+ student and only struggling with one class a year to stay motivated. He's a kid that doesn't care what you think about his work ethic, if something doesn't interest him he's not going to do it or do the bare minimum that will get him by without being hassled.

For my other nephew - he works for approval. A good job and a gold star makes him happy as a pig in mud.

Depends on the kid. If the kid did well and you did this as a fun extra treat then yea. but not for a kid who didn't try unless for the money.. I think a lesson more than a prize needs to be given there.

Although I would prefer the idea of a special family outing type reward over just cash.

but yea, depends on the kid, depends on the parents. I don't think there is anything wrong for it any more so than giving your kid ice cream for eating his vegetables lol they do eventually learn to eat em without the treat!

Some parents prefer EAT THEM OR ELSE
some prefer compromise/treats

Either way, no wrong way to really parent short of beating the kid into getting good grades lol

Nope.

My payment for getting an A was not getting yelled at. My mom is the type of person who grounded me and took away all privileges for getting a B, and god forbid I ever came home with a C.

It's a good thing I liked school and learning, or else I could see her "style" backfiring very quickly :/

Actually, I forgot about it but my grandma would give us money for grades. It was a tiny deal to me because I easily got good grades with no effort. My brother struggled and still didnt often get "good" grades.

It is not something I would do as honeslty, I hate the concept of "grades" and find then arbitrary at best, actually damaging at worse. Grades tell you absolutely nothing about how and what the child is learning

Not really though, right? You don't get the same automatic pat on the back every few months that you did in school. Sometimes you're just expected to do your job, and do it well, even exceptionally well. No one is going to give you a gold star for that. I know it was a transition for me and a lot of my friends after years of regular validation from good grades.

And, TBH, it makes me sad that school comes down so much to grades. Yes, I cared (A LOT) about grades my whole life, but school (ideally), especially post-HS, should be about more than getting good grades.

I don't get paid for grades. I'm expected to get good grades and god forbid I don't. Some friends do though and some get paid an extraordinary amount. I did get given a laptop though for getting into the school I managed to get into. That's the only time though.

I would not. My parents never gave me money for good grades, and I was a straight-A student. They thought I should be motivated to do well because I wanted to do well, not because I thought I'd be getting money out of it. I remember asking them once because one of my friends got paid for getting A's, and they basically laughed in my face.

My mom always told me that feeling good about my accomplishments should be reward enough. LOL.
I started majorly slacking off in 8th grade and that pretty much carried on until I graduated high school. Maybe I would have worked harder if there was some sort of incentive - not to brag on myself but I was a smart kid lol, I could easily remember information and get As on tests, I just hated doing the homework. So I didn't.

Not that money has to be the answer. I would have been happy getting a bag of candy or dessert at Dairy Queen for bringing home a good report card. Just something tangible for the hard work.