Quick Strategy: Give Meaningful Choices
Giving children meaningful choices throughout the day means they’re more likely to cooperate, stay engaged, and feel valued
Give Meaningful Choices
Want a simple way to boost engagement and reduce challenging behaviors? Try giving children meaningful choices. It’s a simple strategy with big results.
Here’s why it works:
When children have some control over what they’re doing, they’re more likely to cooperate, stay engaged, and feel valued.
STEP-BY-STEP
How To Do It
Offer just 2 or 3 choices
Too many choices can be overwhelming for young children. You might ask, "Would you like to open your milk or peel your banana first?” Or, at clean-up time, “Would you like to clean up the blocks or puzzles?"
Make sure both choices are acceptable ones
It’s important that both choices you offer feel like acceptable ones, and that one choice is not a punishment, such as “You can clean up blocks or else you can’t go outside.”
Pause and give children a few seconds
After you offer the choices, pause and give children a few seconds to decide. A good trick is to silently count to 5 to make sure you don't rush their decision.
Acknowledge a child's choice
Once children have made a choice, acknowledge it with a thumbs up or quick praise.
Try it!
Tomorrow, look for one moment in your day where you can replace a direction with a choice—and see how your students respond.
What's Next?
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