Keeping your students engaged all year long can be a daunting task. Final Fridays are a great “entry level” reward that you can maintain all year long without becoming overwhelmed. 

Final Fridays are events hosted once a month by grade levels or whole schools. Students must earn enough points over the month to purchase a ticket to attend the event. For instance, you might set a threshold of 100 points to attend Final Friday. You can change threshold each month as necessary.

Final Fridays show students the importance of saving up points over time.

When students choose to save up and attend a Final Friday, they get to see how their hard work slowly builds into something great.

Emily Gilbride is an education consultant at Saint Joseph Catholic School. When she first arrived at Saint Joseph’s, the school used a paper system to track behavior and rewards. Emily found LiveSchool and streamlined Saint Joseph’s token economy, allowing teachers to track points and rewards all in one app.

Now, Emily and her teachers can focus on the important work, like teaching their students positive character traits and habits before they enter high school.

We are trying to teach important life skills like how to earn and save over time. Final Fridays are part of our program for teaching these skills.

On the final Friday of each month, Saint Joseph’s hosts a party for their scholars. Those who do not earn enough points to attend stay back in a study hall with a volunteer teacher. Everyone else gets a chance to play, sing, and hang out with their friends depending on the theme. Emily markets these events with posters and, “If I forget, one of our students is fast to remind me that I need to plan Final Friday.” Clearly the students of Saint Josephs are invested!

Get Final Friday ideas from Emily’s Final Friday Calendar below and download the Announcement she sends home to parents here!