When my oldest was about six months old I remember reading an article about kids doing chores. Wait! Let’s just stop there for a minute, I was knee high in stinky diapers and baby food, why did I stop and read that article?
Oh I remember, it was my first kiddo and I had expectations through the roof, I was probably imagining him dusting baseboards by his first birthday. Ha!
I forgot about the article, 6 years went by, three more kiddos made their appearances, and we still hadn’t done anything much in the realm of chores. Sure, My Hubs and I had general expectations for the kids making their beds and such, but nothing official.
Then about four months ago, somewhere in the back cobwebs of my mind, I remembered the gist of the chores article that I had read so many years ago. It was basically giving chores as the answer to most parenting and children issues.
It went something to the effect of…
Children disobeying? …..The answer is chores.
Children fighting with each other? …..More chores.
Children bored? ……Chor-didi-chore-chores.
Children using inappropriate language? …..Did I mention the “C” word?!”
Doesn’t that sounds great? I kinda wanted chores to solve all my problems!
If only the list would have added,
Children waking up super early? …..Chores.
Children having daily diaper blowouts? …..more chores.
Okay, I guess chores weren’t going to solve ALL my problems. But if all I got out of it was a little more cleanliness around here, and something to keep the kids busy for a bit, I was game.
Now, because I got pretty excited about jumping on the chore train, I probably spent a little too much time online reading articles about kids and chores. But after all the reading, I figured I just needed to do what would work for our family. So I’m going to tell you what I did and maybe it will be helpful to some of you!
First, I made a list of the most important jobs that need to get done around our house.
I don’t really care if my 6 year old can clean the coffee maker like a pro, I’d rather he help me with the mountain in the middle of our house named “laundry.” So, I made a small list of what would be truly helpful.
Next, I listed specific chores that I thought were realistic and age appropriate for each of my kiddos (the baby just missed the age cutoff so he wasn’t included, ha.).
In case you didn’t catch that, the key word being realistic.
Could my four year old dust the top of the fan blades if I held onto his legs and stood at the foot of the ladder? Uh probably, but do I really want him or need him to do that?
A resounding, “No.”
But would it be easy and helpful for him to put all the dishes on the counter after a meal and then wipe the table down with a wash cloth?
A resounding, “Yes!”
I found these two lists and they were super very helpful…
And this one from modestmom.com…
After I made my list for each kid, I went online to look for chore charts. There are a gazillion out there. There are ones that you can print out, ideas for making your own, or some you can just buy online.
Since I had high hopes for chores changing our lives and lasting for years, I chose to invest in a chore chart that I thought would last us awhile AND that my kids would get excited about. After all, I figured if this whole chore thing was going to happen, it would be SO much easier if they caught the chore fever too! (also, I am craft challenged, so there’s that)
Soooooo, I got this one off of Etsy.
And I love it. And they LOVE IT. (Disclaimer: my kids are still young enough to get excited about basically anything that I get excited about).
They love it because it’s on the side of the fridge and they can easily see their chores each morning and they love it even more when they get a check mark next to their completed chores!
Since I have four kiddos, I got a chart with four names. However, since the baby juuuuust missed the height requirement for vacuuming (there I go again joking about putting the baby to work), I covered up his name with a piece of tape that says “Everyone.” This was easier because there are some things that all of the kiddos do each day, like making their beds. Thus, they have “everyone” chores and then individual chores.
I liked this chart because it included many of the chores that I had put on my list for each kiddo and it also came with blank tiles so that I could just add my own if it didn’t include ones that I wanted to use.
Right now, we give my 6 year old and 4 year , three individual chores a day and then two to three “everyone” chores. We started with less but they loved it and finished quickly, so we added a few more. (Side note – these chores DO NOT take them all day, almost all of them take less than 5 minutes each).
My two year old, really loves to help as well, but she gets distracted easily and is in and out all the time, so she just gets one individual chore a day, usually, “pick up toys” or “get the mail.”
Rewards
The next morning, assuming the kiddos finished all their chores, they get to put a sticker on the reward chart (which is the highlight of their morning because they get to pick the sticker).
I use this reward chart. I print it out in black and white (ink is expensive!) and you can find it here along with many other charts…
(I cross out the words “Goal” and write in my kids names)
Even though there are only ten stars to fill, it usually takes about two weeks for them to earn a reward. We don’t do chores on Sunday and sometimes we are busy and miss a day here and there.
My Hubs and I decided the kid’s rewards would be family activities that we all do together. This works wonderfully for us because there are so many special things that we would love to do for our kids but that if we said “yes” to all the time, would probably result in four bratty children.
For example, we have a zoo membership. We go to the zoo a couple times a month. There are two things our kids want every time we go to the zoo. They want dip and dots ice cream and they want to take the pirate boat ride. We bought ice cream once and we haven’t done the boat ride. Why haven’t we taken the boat ride? Because the boat ride is a perfect chore reward! It is something we would actually love to do with them, but we aren’t about to start dishing out an extra $4 a person every time we go to the zoo for a boat ride! However, if they work for two weeks to earn their boat ride then, “Yes!” we are ALL ABOUT the Pirate boat ride.
There are endless family activities that our kids would love to do, so it isn’t hard for them to come up with and agree on, their reward. Although, I do give them two or three suggestions.
A few rewards that we have done together are ice skating…
(Clearly we were all super comfortable on the ice)
We also went and ate ice cream at the park, and so far the biggest reward for them was going to a movie theater for the first time!
(Another side note – these family activities don’t have to break the bank! The ice skating cost $12 total, ice cream at the park was under $10, and we went to a movie theater that had free kids movies one Saturday morning and discounted snacks, so we paid $10 total for popcorn, drinks, and fruit snacks! It doesn’t have to cost a lot of money to be fun!)
Training them up
Sooooo, it didn’t take long for the kids to find out what chores they really like to do and which ones they’d rather avoid. It also didn’t take me long me to see who is good at doing what!
My 6 year old is so bad at dusting. So. Bad. But my 4 year old is awesome at it. My 4 year old is so bad at sorting the silverware. But my 6 year old is stellar at it.
So, I keep that in mind when I assign the chores in the morning before they wake up. They still end up doing all the jobs at some point, but they repeat the ones they enjoy more often.
After all, I’m not Cinderella’s evil stepmother here! My goal is not to rest on the couch and watch them tirelessly clean the entire house and then have them feed me grapes one by one after they finish! No, I just want them to learn some responsibility, realize they are part of a family that helps each other, and last I want to teach them HOW to clean.
Did you know that some kids (and adults) don’t actually know how to clean? That’s because you have to be taught! Which brings me to my next point.
How I teach my kids to do chores…or learn just about anything new.
This IS NOT rocket science, it’s just four easy steps I keep in mind when teaching my kids any new skill…
It’s pretty self-explanatory, but just to leave you without any doubts, I will give you an example.
So, let’s say I am going to teach my 4 year old son how to wipe down the kitchen table after a meal.
First, I do it 100% for him. He watches me wipe down the table while I explain what I’m doing. “See buddy, how I put my hand flat on the washcloth and move it back and forth making sure to get all the parts of the table.”
Second, we do it together and I correct anything. “Well buddy, that was a great start but you missed that entire corner over there and see how I put my hand flat on it? That will make it faster and easier for you. Now repeat after me, “wax on, wax off”” (perhaps he will be a karate master after our chore training…or more likely be confused at my movie references that came out waaaaay before he was born. But we’re fine either way).
Third, I watch him do it by himself. “Great job so far! Just finish that spot and you got it!”
Fourth, after I watch him do it a few times and I think he’s more or less got a handle on that skill, then he can do it independently.
Woohoo! I just referenced my four year old and the word “independently” in the same sentence!
Soooo, that’s it. That’s the process we’ve been using and it’s been working well for us.
But the question still remains, “Have chores been the answer to all my problems?”
And my answer?
I wish! No, it hasn’t stopped blowout diapers, two year old tantrums, or picky eaters.
However, I could easily list ten awesome things that it HAS done! But for the sake of your eyeballs I will just list three.
Three benefits from doing family chores…
1. The saying, “Many hands make light work” is really true. Having our kiddos share in the work has definitely lightened the load for My Hubs and me. Hallelujah! …we could stop the list right there! No, but seriously we could. But fine, I will keep going.
2. My kids have definitely learned some skills. They are much better dusters, sweepers, book put awayers, and clothes separators now than they were six months ago.
3. They now understand that extra awesome feeling that you get when you get to do something fun because you’ve worked hard for several weeks and earned it.
Perhaps, in the future it will lead to more than this, but for right now, I’m just happy I can see the floor in the playroom a little more often!
So, I’d love to hear from you! Do you have a chore system? Has it worked for our family? What has worked well and what hasn’t?
Simple and Sweet 