Podcast Episode 89: Why Reward Charts Stop Working for Children
Podcast Host: Sharon Collon
You're scrolling on Instagram and perhaps you see a sticker chart and you think, oh my gosh, that's gonna be my whole new family identity. and week one, you buy it, and week one, it's magic.
Your child is racing to the fridge, and there's gold stars and little magnets everywhere. And they're doing the very thing that's been a battle for months. There's no fights, no reminders, and you think finally this is the one. This fixes it. Then week two, nobody can find the stupid chart, and you've lost all the stupid magnets, and the gold stars are all over the floor, and your dog has eaten one.
And it goes into your kitchen drawer, the graveyard of abandoned reward systems. And I mean all of them. The sticker charts, the token jars, the pockets, money apps, laminated wall planners you were so hopeful about.
And I really need you to hear this. This has nothing to do with you being not consistent enough. And your child is not lazy. How much money have I wasted on stupid charts? Honestly.
Reward charts stop working for children with ADHD for reasons built right into how the ADHD brain runs. And once you understand those reasons, the fix becomes obvious. It's just not a better chart.
I'm Sharon Collon. I'm a PCC credentialed ADHD coach and parenting consultant. I'm a mom of three beautiful boys with ADHD. And I want you to know before we go any further that I have bought every reward chart and app and everything on the market. Every single one, I'm pretty sure. So I'm not standing outside this judging anyone. I've lived that bloody kitchen drawer where hope goes to die.
But before we get started on today's episode, can you please take one minute to go and leave this podcast a review? It really helps me continue to bring you more episodes just like this where I provide this free support. Please go and leave us a review. I will do a happy dance in your honor.
I honestly shudder to think how much I've spent over the years. Apps, charts, programs, everything. I have laminated stuff, I have bought stickers, I've had elaborate magnet systems, I have had so I've trialed everything for the ADHD brain in terms of the best reward chart.
And obviously, as my kids are getting a little bit older now, I'm a little bit more cynical about it. I get approached maybe once a week, maybe a couple of times a week, about me promoting various apps and things for ADHD. I always say no. And the reason being that the reward pathway isn't often one that has longevity in it. And what's worse is it often puts the app right in the hands of the
puts the phone or the device right in the hands of the child with ADHD. And we know that that can be hard to transition off and get distracted by. So I have wasted a lot of money on this. And I want you to know that if you are nodding your head, you're doing that too, that there is no judgment here. I am one of you. I always think that this next system is going to be the answer to this. And I just want you to know that
Even though I am trained in this, I still get sucked into all of the ads and think that it's going to be my whole family's new identity. So we're going to break this down. So I have worked with over 40,000 families and I can tell you why reward charts don't work. And it is something that we talk about kind of consistently amongst our communities. And it's a real shame. It's a real shame that they don't work because it would be so easy, right? Like it would be such a good fix, but it doesn't.
So here's the plan for today. I'm going to give you the two reasons why reward charts often fail and then two reasons why they fail, and then why it's not a willpower problem, not your child's willpower and not yours. And the thing that works instead with real examples that you can build this week.
And stay with me right into the end because this is your last chance to register for the ADHD Family System. We're doing that in the first week of September. If you're listening to this live on 2026, how are we talking about September 2026? It makes me sick. I can't believe this year is going so fast. so I'm gonna invite you to our free ADHD.
family system session. So make sure you go head into the show notes or you can go to the functionalfamily.com forward slash system and grab your free spot so we can map all of this stuff out together and spend some time together. And it's going to be super fun for that coaching week.
we know the ADHD brain is based on interest and novelty, whereas the neurotypical brain is based on importance. So the neurotypical person, even though they don't want to do the thing and they might procrastinate or get like, you know, stall doing the thing, ultimately, if it's important.
they are able to override and engage their executive functions. The same can't be said for ADHD, where it's interest and novelty based, right? So it has to be interesting or novel to be able to use their executive functions and be able to get the task done.
So, simply put, when it comes to reward charts, it works for the first week and then not the second week because the novelty runs out. So here's the mechanism: a reward chart bets everything on two things: novelty and the payoff that comes off, and the payoff that comes later. Now, the ADHD brain is kind of wired against both of them. So when the chart is brand new, it's interesting and novel. And the novelty gives the ADHD brain a hit of dopamine.
Dopamine is the brain chemical that drives motivation. So that's your week one magic right there. That's why it works on that first week. It was never really the chart. It was the novelty giving them the dopamine heat. But novelty fades fast. Dopamine moves on to the next new interesting thing. And the moment the chart stops be being interesting, well, it stops working. So here's the reframe I want you to hold.
The chart didn't fail because your child gave up. It failed because it was running on a fuel that always runs out.
That's reason one. Reason two is about the timing. And honestly, it's the bigger one. most charts pay out later. They rely on delayed gratification. So five stars by Friday, and then you get the reward. Simple enough, right? A neurotypical brain can hold a goal like that across the week. It can feel Fridays, it can feel and picture.
Friday's reward on a Tuesday and let that pull it along. But an interest-based ADHD brain really struggles to feel a reward that isn't happening right now. There's two time modes. There's now and not now, right? Not now is not important because it's not now. And not now can be any time, Friday, next year, next month. I don't know. We don't have that time awareness, right? So there's a saying I love for this: the ADHD.
Brain pays in cash, not credit. The ADHD brain pays in cash, not credit. I was once talking to my son about a reward. I was like, if you can get through this haircut, I will buy you an ice cream. Right. And he was, he looked at me in all seriousness, like the seriousness of like an Italian mobster and just went, Show me the ice cream. He was like, I am not sitting through that unless I can see the reward. He's like, Too often it is.
been delayed, that reward has been delayed, and I haven't got it instantly. Show me the bloody ice cream, right? And so now in my head, when we're talking about rewards, yes, you can use them, but show him the ice cream. Have the thing right there. and rewards aren't my favorite go-to in terms of ADHD parenting. I think it's trickier, but look, I'm up for anything that works, right? So sometimes you have to show them the ice cream. what what I'm basically saying with that example is the ADHD brain pays in cash, not
Credit. Just be careful if you're using credit. If you're using credit, if there's delayed gratification involved, remember it doesn't work like that. Showing the ice cream. let that sit for a second. Cash, not credit. A prize on Friday is almost no pull on a Tuesday. and it isn't that your child has forgotten about it.
so it's genuinely that they can't feel it. It's not real to them yet. Added also a little side note here, that a lot of people with autism also have this thing called ampantasia, where they can't actually mentally picture something that isn't in front of them. So if I was to say to you, think of an orange, imagine the smell of the orange, imagine the little dimples on the skin of the orange, imagine what it'd feel like to touch the orange. A lot of some people with ampantasia can't.
Do that. They can't actually do that movie of the mind strategy. So just worth noting. so that's why show me the ice cream has a pull. Show me the ice cream. Pay in cash, not credit. It's not real to them unless it's in front of them. So what you end up with is a tool that's motivating for about a week and then it just becomes one more thing on your list to maintain.
So where does it leave us? So a lot of parents just end up landing in this place of guilt, really. It's my child is not trying hard enough, I'm not consistent enough. And the answer is none of those, right? This is a trap that reward charts quietly set.
When the chart stops working, it looks like a willpower problem, your child or yours. So everyone doubles down and tries harder. I often find myself talking about that one week where it actually magically worked, right? You bring in bigger rewards, you might throw in a consequence if you get desperate, you become more elaborate, there might be more colorful charts or more charts, and none of it holds because the problem was never effort.
You are asking a brain with genuine motivation and timing differences to run on a system that was designed for a brain that doesn't live in your house.
And here's the core of it. A child with ADHD can truly want to do the thing. They want to do their morning sequence. They can know exactly how to do the thing and still not do the thing because the gap between intention and action is precisely where ADHD lives. And no sticker closes that gap for long.
Letting go of the willpower story is the first real thing I want you to just drop. Your child isn't choosing not to try. The tool was working against their wiring the whole time. Okay, so here's a question worth sitting with.
Think about the routines in your house that actually run smoothly. Now, I'm always fascinated when I'm working with a family and they say that they have no routine. And you guys know I don't love the word routine. I genuinely try and change it. I don't love the word routines. I actually refer to them as rhythms in my own house because I feel like rhythm has this like nice.
Sequencing and a bit of flow to it. You can actually change things up depending on capacity. a lot of people have a negative feeling towards the word routine. We've tried routines that don't work for our family. But a lot of families will come into working with me saying, We've tried it. We have no routine. We need to get a better routine. It's all like got this whole bit of expectation around it. They've been told they've got to have good routines for children with ADHD.
And it's almost never the case, right? Like everyone runs patterns. Humans are pattern-making machines.
if you ever want to test whether you are a pattern-making machine, go into your shower and try and do your shower sequence of how you wash yourself in the opposite order. It'll blow your mind at how much it upsets you and how unsatisfying that shower is, and how much brain space you have to think about to be able to run that pattern backwards. You are a habit making pattern running machine.
It's just whether those habits are working for you And the good news is we can actually influence and set up things to make those work in our favor.
So let's backtrack a little bit to think about a rhythm in your house that actually runs smoothly. I bet you I could find one. I reckon that you're not giving yourself credit for something that actually is working. The one that just happens, you know, like there's just there'll be a little part of that sequence that just happens without a fight, without you nagging. How many of those are running on a reward? This is my question.
How many of the patterns in your house or the rhythms in your house are running on a reward? How many just happen because the setup makes them easy?
Sit with that. It's been my experience through working with so many families that almost no systems, rhythms, patterns run because of a reward.
It's the environment and the setup that actually makes them easy and removes barriers so the person can hit the target. Because almost nobody's smooth rhythms are running on stickers, guys. They're running on setup. And that right there is the whole answer. It's already alive somewhere in your house. We just need to do it on purpose. It's easier than you think. So let's talk about what works instead.
And the answer is always, always systems. A system removes decision instead of rewarding it.
There's a difference cleanly. A reward asks your child to choose the hard thing and then pays them for choosing it. A system changes the environment so the hard thing becomes the easy, obvious next step, and it barely needs a decision at all.
That is worth writing down.
Rewards lean on motivation. And for the ADHD brain, motivation is unreliable by design. And a system leans on setup and the setup stays put. Let me make this real because it's abstract until you can see it. Let's use the school bag, the reward version of a star every time the child puts their bag away. And you know how this goes now. It works for a week, it fades, it becomes your job to track and enforce.
The system version is a hook at your child's height right beside the door where they actually walk through with nothing else competing for that spot. And the bag goes there because that's the easiest place for it to go. No star, no tracking, no daily admin landing on you.
Remember in ADHD parenting, if we want to increase the behavior or increase the likelihood of a behavior, we remove barriers. If we want to decrease the behavior, we add barriers, right? So please do not have in your launch pad drawers that you pull out, cupboards that you open, things that you have to move to get to the thing. That's adding a barrier. We need to make it the easiest, most easiest course of action to.
put that child's bag on the hook. It needs to be the easiest so the system holds it.
Now, here are a few principles that make a system stick where charts always slide, four of them. The first, make the right thing. Make the course of action the easiest thing. Reduce the number of steps, the distance between your child and the behavior you want. Effort is the enemy, so design it out of it. Your strategy should require the least amount of effort. The second, anchor it to something that already happens. So attach the new habit to an existing one.
So shoes off, then the bag on hook. So it rides along on a routine that's already running instead of needing its own energy. The third, take the admin off the most taxed person in the house. And let's be honest, that's usually you if you're listening to this podcast. A good system often runs without a scorekeeper. If it needs you to remember every single day, it's a chart in disguise.
And here's the fourth. Build it once, set it up right and let it work, refining it as you need to go. A chart needs daily maintenance forever, but a well-designed system, you should be able to scale back your involvement over time. So once it's set up, you should be able to let it look after itself with mi and scale back your prompting.
From managing behavior to designing the environment. It's the difference between a fix that lasts a week and one that actually lasts.
So you may ask me, do rewards have a place? Well, yes, I'm not against anything that works, right? Genuine in-the-moment connection and praise are powerful. Celebrating in a real win with your child is never ever wasted. And a novelty can genuinely help kickstart something brand new.
So if you want to use that week one energy effectively, deliberately to get something off the ground, go for it, but just don't expect that to hold you long term.
remember, don't lean on anything that involves delayed gratification. Show me the ice cream. Remember that. All these weird analogies. So the trouble is only when a reward chart becomes the whole strategy, the thing the entire house leans on to make daily life run.
Because for the routines that have to happen every single day, a system will always outlast a chart every time for the simple reason that it doesn't depend on anyone staying motivated. The system should catch you on your low capacity day. So if you're going to do one thing from after this episode, do this. Start with one friction point. Don't just say whole morning, go for granular here. We're going for one friction point, like putting the bag on the hook or whatever one.
You think you want to start on. Just one. Pick the moment in your day that you know breaks most reliably and design the environment around that granular one part. Make it the path of least resistance. Make it easy. One system that holds beats five charts that don't.
Now that's the work that I take families through in my free online session, the ADHD Family System. We will map your friction points onto a friction map. We're gonna do this live together. It's gonna be so much fun. And it's the approach that
Finally ends the reward chart graveyard in your kitchen drawer. Now it's completely free. I'm doing a free coaching week. There's three sessions to choose from. It's in the first week of September. If you want to register your spot, then you can grab your session that suits you at the functionalfamily.com forward slash system. The link is in the show notes too.
I want to remind you that you do not need to spend any more money on a better chart. We actually need an environment that supports the action. I'll see you in the next episode.
