Training Children to do Chores Version 3.0

This week marked the great unveiling to the children of my latest and greatest Chore Lists.

Taking a trip down memory lane, I think I first really routenized chores when the oldest children were five and three years old. Then I brought them up to a new level of chores when #4 was born 17 months ago. And now we're raising the bar again, so that's three versions in about two-and-a-half years. It seems like a good pace for growing children to revamp the system annually.

This year I read Managers of Their Chores (MOTC), which is geared toward large families (much larger than ours!) and is strictly routenized. I think people find the whole Managers of Their Homes series very inspiring, rather peculiar, or both (I'm in that latter camp). (I still recommend reading "Large Family Logistics" first and foremost, but this post is about the changes I've made based on MOTC.)

From MOTC, I got the idea and materials for making Chore Packs. Why Chore Packs? I am trying to solve the trouble that comes with the mother and children repeatedly running to the list of directions posted on the wall to check what we are to do next--and probably becoming distracted along the way. The idea behind Chore Packs is to train the children into following a list of steps: the list is clipped to their shirt so they can't forget it! As each numbered task is completed, the child moves the little card to the back of the pack to read the next task. (If one has pre-literate children, the MOTC system comes with clip art images of chores.)

John checking his Chore Pack

I am particularly hopeful that the Chore Packs will help with personal care in the morning and evening. In getting four children plus myself ready each morning, I am constantly cycling back to each child.

Have you brushed teeth yet? No, why are you playing Legos? Did you make your bed? No, you're playing dollies! I've already warned you four times! 

Every morning, the 3.5-year-old makes her own bed, with me standing there pleasantly voicing the steps:
bring up the sheet, bring up the blanket, fold down the sheet, fluff the pillow.

Yes, I could sit with each child and do every single step with them, but I really do expect more of seven- and five-year-olds, and even the three-year-old: at what point can I expect a child to get dressed, brush his teeth, and make his bed without twenty-seven reminders, right? I am hoping these Chore Packs help get them into a habit of doing the same list of steps every morning and every night.

Mary checking her Chore Pack

The authors of MOTC emphasize parts of any chore system which are critical: fathers, gratitude, teaching, and consequences.

Husbands/Fathers
The husband-and-wife authors explain (from a Christian viewpoint) that husbands are the head of the family so it is, in fact, husbands who are ultimately responsible for everything within the home. The buck stops here! Husbands are responsible for all the homemaking, chores, and cooking that are needed within a home. They may delegate it to the homemaking wife and she may delegate some of it to the children, but it is the husband's responsibility that somehow those chores get done. Therefore, if the wife is being unable to do it all, he should help her figure out solutions. And if the wife is struggling to get the children's cooperation in helping or in doing a decent job (for their ages), then it is the husband's responsibility to fix that problem.

When I finished revamping our chore lists, I asked Chris' input as well as explained the organization to him in detail. Then he called the children to a family meeting and he presented the summary of the new system before handing the stage over to me to explain the details. I think this fatherly authority in presentation goes far in obtaining the children's cooperation.

The 5-year-old makes her bed by herself now.
The 7-year-old can even strip his sheets and put on new sheets and bedding.

Gratitude
As an extension of the above point about husbands, the authors emphasize that husbands should never take for granted the wives and children doing the housework. If the housework is ultimately the husband's responsibility, then he owes continual gratitude and appreciation for the other family members doing that work. In that vein, the mother as adult is responsible for the chores being completed in a way the children are not, so she owes them gratitude. Yes, she may be requiring the children to work, to participate in family life, but she owes them gratitude and specific thanks for all their assistance.

This is an area needing improvement, so I've been sure to lavish many 'thank yous' and compliments (where deserved) about a job well done. Especially with our oldest, who is in a phase of desiring freedom and responsibility, I've many times mentioned what a joy and help it is to have a young man (using those words) learning to be so competent as a helper to make the home run.

Teaching
We adults find it so easy to make a bed or clear dishes from the table, it is difficult to remember that children start out knowing nothing. They need training in every single step, in a cheerful and relaxed manner, not when we're in the midst of cooking dinner or getting out the door to an appointment. And they need the training dozens or hundreds of times. It is unfair to expect children to do chores decently without a lot of cheerful training. MOTC recommends, in fact, having a regular time set aside daily for training some chore or the other.

This requires much thoughtfulness from me. Right now, using our new system, I am considering that it is not a time-saver for me for some time (weeks, months). Right now, I am right there with the children for every chore that is new to them, such as washing dishes. I'm talking through each dish, where it is loaded, in what order to wash, how much to rinse or not rinse. I'm purposefully using a cheerful voice (divorced from how I might be feeling at the time) and I'm trying to have us sing songs while we work--because who can be a sourpuss then?

Consequences
Homeschooling mothers are often so overwhelmed and busy, we do things like give twenty-seven reminders to get ready in the morning instead of simply giving a consequence immediately (not that I know anyone who would do that once or even most days of the week). We having loving hearts, so we make excuses, such as that child is tired or hungry or that book is very interesting and how could a child not be distracted by wanting to sit and read instead of putting her pajamas in the drawer. MOTC argues that any and every chore system will fail without consequences already established and ready to be implemented. The authors' suggestion is quite simple and works for any child of writing age: If the child won't follow his Chore Pack list for getting ready in the morning, the child is assigned to write out the steps (writing sentences). For example, the child would have to write:

1. Get dressed.
2. Put pajamas away.
3. Make bed.
4. Brush teeth.

This can be adapted to any refusal, such as having to write out the steps for cleaning the bathroom if the child refuses to clean the bathroom on his day to do it or does an unacceptably sloppy job.

(If a parent doesn't possess the authority to tell a child to write sentences--or do whatever the consequence is--and have the child comply, that is a deeper problem to be addressed and, I'd imagine, needs to be tackled before a better chore system in the home. In fact, trying to implement chores can be a very revealing exercise about the state of parental authority in the home. This transition this week has gone great so far but there have certainly been our "moments.")

Our Chores

This post is probably boring enough, so I won't fatigue my readers with an exact list of what chores my children are assigned. There are great Chore Lists By Age available on the Internet. I will mention a few big changes I've implemented:

1. We've done our chores in the afternoon for several years now, but now we are trying to do them in the morning: after getting dressed for the day and before starting school. The afternoon was a bit troublesome:

A. If we're on an outing, it is in the afternoons, so that day we'd simply skip that day's chore, not to rotate around to it till a week later.

B. Sometimes someone would be napping, so he couldn't do his chores or we couldn't go in that bedroom or upstairs lest we wake that child.

C. We are all generally more crabby in the afternoons.

So, we are trying our chores in the morning, when we're fresh, motivated, and cheerful. Instead of my goal of starting school daily by 9:00, my new goal is 9:30. So far, the children love this change! I've noticed that I'll be finishing up in the kitchen and a child will dash off, saying, "I'm going to go find out what my chores are this morning!"

Vacuuming is still my adult responsibility. But inevitably the children run over and ask for a turn. I think by about age 8-9, I will have our oldest start vacuuming. One of his chores is to use the carpet sweeper on the den rug, which gets so dirty, mid-week.

2. Now following advice of far more experienced mothers that I'd disregarded for years, I am giving children ownership over certain areas instead of trying to make everything perfectly fair.

It was such a hassle to check the list every single night to determine whose night it was to clear the dishes or empty the dishwasher. Then the kids would fight, arguing that it was the other child's night, or one child got mixed up yesterday so shouldn't have to do it today. Now, I am giving ownership. So, for example, one child is going to empty the dishwasher, all loads, every day, along with babysitting Joseph during meal clean-up, and sweeping after each meal. Another child is going to be in charge of wiping the table after every meal. Although we all clean bathrooms, I made it official that the five-year-old "owns" the downstairs bathroom, the seven-year-old "owns" the upstairs bathroom, and I "own" the master bathroom. This should also aid in knowing who failed to do a chore because I know who owns that area.

The children each clean one bathroom: counter surfaces, toilet surfaces, floor. I come behind and do the windows with Windex, sink and tub with Soft Scrub, and toilet bowl with Lysol Toilet Cleaner. But if I was too tired/sick to do my chores even for a week or two, the children's job would make for a good-looking bathroom.

3. I am giving the children "apprenticeships," which has them very excited and feeling like big kids instead of oppressed servants. The seven-year-old is in a laundry apprenticeship. He is now in charge of collecting all towels, laundering them, and folding them, with my merely looking on. Later, he will achieve mastery and graduate to laundering clothing.

The 7-year-old laundering towels

Both five- and seven-year-olds are in dish-washing apprenticeships. My older one is in charge of washing the breakfast dishes and the younger the lunch dishes (by which I mean rinsing and loading dishes into the dishwasher, while I will still do hand-washing of items like pots). At this early stage, this is taking great investment from me: there are no short-cuts. I am standing right there, cheerfully coaching through how much to rinse or not rinse, what needs actual scrubbing, what gets loaded in the top rack and bottom. As the weeks go by, they will know more and more what to do.

Also, I am having to exercise much self-discipline to call back the children who have scattered away with distraction to return and do such-and-such task they forgot. It would be so much easier when the last task remaining is to wipe the kitchen table to do it myself than to go upstairs and call my five-year-old away from her tea party (which she might protest), but then I am teaching my child nothing. I have to think with a long view, not a short one.

The 7-year-old washing dishes

So far, honestly, the children are--for the most part--quite interested and excited to have a revised chore system: new tracking method and some increased tasks. They've been doing daily housework alongside me for nearly three years now, so the concept is familiar. I've noticed lately that our seven-year-old is at a yearning and stretching stage in which he wants to be a much Bigger Guy with more responsibility and freedom: he actually jumped up and down when he learned that he would "get" to have an apprenticeship to learn laundry and dishes.

I am also so interested to hear from other families what has worked or not worked for you to have family involvement with chores!