Family Movie Night

Usually we have a no screen time in our home.  The girls don’t get to watch TV throughout the day (and if someone else is watching and they get sucked in, mean mommy turns it off immediately!)  They don’t get to play with phones, tablets, video games or on the computer.  Instead they read, play with dolls, draw, write stories and much more.  TV time is usually reserved for when I need them to sit quietly so I can do something important (I call it my “Mommy Magic!”)

But we did decide recently to start a weekly family movie night in which we all sit down and enjoy movie together, usually with pizza or some other yummy dinner treat.  But it’s not a given, it’s something they have to earn and we, the parents, have the right to revoke movie night at any time.  Or to postpone or reschedule as needed.

We started family movie night for a few reasons.  First, the girls were constantly begging to watch the movies they’ve (somehow) amassed over the years and while I prefer no screen time, I also know that a little bit is not harmful.  Plus, we all need the break once in a while.  It is nice to sit down for a little quiet time with the whole family and just relax.  It’s also really fun to share some of our childhood memories with the girls.  Movies like Willie Wonka and the Chocolate Factory and Dumbo which were some of our childhood favorites are even more exciting as adults, watching them through the eyes of our children for the first time!

In order to earn their movie time, we’ve instituted a “minutes” plan.  Each girl is given 60 minutes of movie time at the beginning of the week and hubby and I have the power to take away minutes throughout the week.  Generally minutes are taken away for not listening and or following directions.  If I ask the girls to put their dishes away and they don’t the first time ask, they lose a minute each time I have to ask again.  And sometimes I’ll take away multiple minutes for blatant non-direction following though I will usually warn them of this “If I have to ask again, I’m taking 5 minutes!”

But we also sometimes take minutes away for bad behavior, for instance if Sugarplum loses her cool and shouts at me or makes a nasty face I may choose to take away 2 or 5 minutes (usually depending on my mood and how the day is going.)  Same thing if Honeybun throws me an attitude or argues with me about doing something I’ve asked her to do.

I keep track of their minutes on simple clocks I printed out.  Each girl has her own clock and I move a clothes pin around the perimeter as they lose minutes, starting at 12:00 (60 minutes) and moving clockwise around the clock, counting the number of minutes lost, not the number of minutes remaining.

At the end of each week (usually Friday but sometimes Saturday or Sunday depending on each week’s events), Honeybun figures out how many total minutes they’ve earned towards our family movie night.  This is probably my most favorite part of the system because it forces her to use many of her 2nd grade math skills she’s working on!

First she reads her clock to see how many minutes she lost, she is very good at quickly reading the numbers (the 5s) but still has trouble remembering there are 5 minutes in between each number so it’s good practice for her.  She then subtracts her minutes lost from 60 which usually requires her to borrow/regroup which is a skill which she has struggled a lot with this year.  She repeats for Sugarplum’s clock then adds both numbers together.

Once she’s figured out how many total minutes they’ve earned they are then tasked with finding a movie that is within a few minutes of that time (it’s not always easy to find one that is EXACTLY their number of minutes earned).  They usually start by going through their video/DVD collection and if they can’t find anything then we will search the family movie selections on Netflix.

We started family movie night earlier in the Spring and so far it’s been a great success for our family.  We all enjoy the time together and it has helped the girls’ behavior immensely.  The whole system is awesome because it visually shows them the consequences of their behavior and it’s an easy system for us to manage and keep up with (I’ve failed miserably at other things we’ve tried like our dessert chart and a napping money plan, both of which didn’t last!)