The Hidden Cost of Gold Stars and Green Zones: Why Rewards and Punishments Still Harm Our Children
I have had so many parents message me recently about schools use of rewards and punishments, and its impact on children. I think we have come so far and it’s incredible that we no longer hit children over the knuckles with rulers or physically harm them in schools but the emotional harm inflicted by modern behaviour management systems can be just as damaging as the physical punishment we've rightfully abandoned.
What We're Really Talking About
When I say rewards, I mean: stickers and stamps, special privileges, names on the "green zone" or climbing the rainbow chart, public praise designed to motivate others, comparison to "good" children who are "making better choices."
When I say punishments, I mean: names on the yellow or red zone, keeping children in at break to finish work, denying them water when they're thirsty, exclusion in any form (from activities, from the classroom, from their peers), refusing toilet access when they need it, public criticism, being held up as the example of what not to do.
The Research We Can't Ignore
Alfie Kohn's extensive work, particularly in Punished by Rewards, dismantles the logic of behaviorist approaches in education. He demonstrates that rewards and punishments are "two sides of the same coin" both are forms of control that teach children to ask not "What kind of person do I want to be?" but rather "What do they want me to do, and what happens to me if I don't do it?"
Kohn's research shows that external motivators actively undermine intrinsic motivation. When children are rewarded for reading, they read less when the rewards stop. When they're praised for sharing, they become less generous over time. The very tools we think are building positive behaviors are actually eroding the internal compass we want children to develop.
The Attachment Wound
Gordon Neufeld's work on attachment and development helps us understand why these systems are so harmful. Children are wired for connection. Their primary psychological need is to maintain proximity and relationship with the adults caring for them. When we use our relationship as leverage, withdrawing approval through punishment or dangling it as reward we wound the very attachment that allows children to develop healthily.
Neufeld explains that children need to feel safe in their dependence on us. When that safety is conditional on compliance, children either harden themselves against us emotionally (making them less receptive to our guidance) or become anxiously preoccupied with pleasing us (losing touch with their own inner sense of self).
The child standing in the "red zone" isn't learning self-regulation. They're learning that their teacher's affection and approval are conditional. They're experiencing shame. And shame, as Neufeld reminds us, is one of the most destructive emotions in child development.
What About Their Feelings?
This is where Aletha Solter's contribution is needed more than ever in today’s schools. Solter, building on attachment research, helps us understand that children's "difficult" behaviour is often a communication of emotional needs or the result of accumulated stress and trauma that needs to be released through crying, tantrums, or other emotional expression with our support.
When we punish the behaviour without addressing the underlying feeling, we teach children that their emotions are unacceptable. The child who couldn't sit still might be dealing with anxiety. The one who lashed out might be carrying stress from home. The one who won't focus on their work might be overwhelmed or struggling with undiagnosed learning differences.
Denying a thirsty child water or a desperate child access to the toilet isn't just unkind it's teaching them that their bodily needs and signals don't matter, that adult convenience trumps their physical discomfort. What are we really teaching when we override a child's basic physiological needs to maintain classroom order?
But Don't Children Need Boundaries?
Well it isn’t actually a need, it would be more accurate to say that there are times when we need to set limits on children’s behaviour. These are sometimes rules we set as guidelines for behaviour or perhaps a temporary limit and on some occasions ‘loving limits’ where we support children to release pent up emotions. The opposite of control isn't chaos it's connection.
Children need clear expectations, natural consequences, and adults who accept all their feelings without judgment. As Kohn emphasises, we can create classrooms built on community, collaboration, and genuine engagement with learning rather than compliance and performing for external validation.
Neufeld would add that children follow those to whom they're attached. When we prioritise relationship over reward charts, children want to cooperate with us, not because they're chasing a sticker but because collaboration is what connected humans do.
What's the Alternative?
We need to move from "behaviour management" to understanding behaviour as communication. We need classroom structures that:
Acknowledge children's feelings and needs as legitimate
Build intrinsic motivation through meaningful, engaging work
Create genuine community rather than competition
Address the root causes of struggles rather than punishing symptoms including zones of regulation
Recognise that children do well when they can (as Ross Greene puts it)
Maintain adult leadership without resorting to shame or coercion
This isn't about permissiveness. It's about recognising that we cannot punish children into better behaviour any more than we could hit them into it and we cannot bribe them into genuine learning, kindness, or self-regulation.
Moving Forward
Our children deserve better than to have their sense of self-worth tied to their position on a chart or zone. They deserve classrooms where they're seen as whole people, not behaviour problems to be managed. They deserve adults who understand that emotional harm, though less visible than physical harm, leaves scars just as deep.
If your child is struggling under these systems, please know: the problem isn't your child. The problem is a system built on outdated behaviourist psychology that reduces complex human beings to simple stimulus-response mechanisms.
You're right to question it. Reach out if you would like some support in navigating these systems together.
Hi, I’m Rebecca.
I’m a parent coach, Aware Parenting Instructor, Soul Collage facilitator, and therapeutic play practitioner. I support parents, caregivers and child care professionals in healing from stress and trauma so they can nurture compassionate connections with themselves and the children in their care. If you’d like to explore ways to support your child’s emotional well-being, I invite you to: Join my Substack for insights on parenting, book a free discovery call, and explore my offerings to help you and children in your care flourish.