Will Paying My Child for Grades Send the Wrong Message?

I still remember the times my grandfather actually threw me a few bucks for my grades. We didn't have anything in writing. No verbal contract. I didn't even have a clue that I was going to be rewarded for my efforts, but I got a little cash anyway, and boy was it satisfying.

But even with such fond memories of getting paid for grades, as a parent of a child soon to be in school, I find myself wondering if paying for grades is indeed the right incentive to dangle in front of my son.

Shouldn't He Want Good Grades Anyway?

The first thing that comes to mind when I consider paying my son for grades is: Shouldn't the desire to get good grades be incentive in itself?

The need for good grades to get into a decent college, to find a good job, to build a wonderful career or to venture out and start his own business should be enough to push him to want to get good grades…right?

Reasoning With a Child

I realize with the train of thought that a child should want to get good grades for the long-term benefit such grades can provide, means that I'm trying to reason with a child who may have little or no real understanding of long-term goals and how these grades can affect his future.

I still remember sitting in college classrooms wondering how the heck some of the stuff they were teaching us would be applicable to the real world since I had no real world experience to apply it to in the first place.

So if I felt like that in college, how is a child of six of seven years of age supposed to equate getting good grades with the potential life altering affects they could have, and the advantages they could provide? Even if I repeat them until I'm blue in the face, the child may realize the positives good grades may bring with them, but fail to fully comprehend the affects those advantages carry over the course of a lifetime.

A Child's Career

I look at a child's schooling as his first career. He starts, learns, builds upon what he's learned, and (hopefully) gets promoted from grade to grade, all in preparation for eventually undertaking such a scenario in the job force. The difference is, in the working world, he'll be getting paid for his efforts.

In my opinion though, if payment structures, bonuses, and similar monetary awards are going to be an integral part of a future career, why not start teaching this aspect early on. Sure, doing so should be balanced with teaching a child to do things for others without the need for monetary reward; however, maybe being paid for grades is simply another way of preparing a child for the reward-based payment structures he will one day encounter in jobs and careers.

So What Should I Do?

Parental reasoning tells me that I shouldn't have to pay my child to get good grades. But then again, I shouldn't have to pay him to do things around the house to earn an allowance. And I don't have to…I choose to. Not so much as an incentive, but as a reward. I like to show my appreciation for his efforts just as a future employer hopefully will one day.

While I don't have any plans to start a reward-based grade system until he is old enough to fully comprehend my reasoning for doing so (maybe around age seven or eight), I think it will be a good way to motivate, encourage and teach him about bonus-based reward structures and better prepare him for the working world he will one day enter.

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Disclaimer:

The author is not a licensed financial professional. This article is for informational purposes only and does not constitute legal or financial advice. Any action taken by the reader due to the information provided in this article is solely at the reader's discretion.