The other day as I was planning a play date with my friend I told her I could come over after the kids did their chores. She asked me how I get my young boys, age 5 and 3 1/2 to clean. I told her a few things, but i thought I'd share a few more.- Dishes, I have my kids help unload the dishwasher. I make it fun by letting them stand on the counter (normally not allowed) while I hand the dishes to put away.
- I also have them rinse their dishes which is fun because they get to use the sprayer, also usually off limits.
- mopping, one of their favorite chores is to mop. I move the table and chair out, get a bucket of water and give them rags. They call it slip and slid and have a blast getting wet. Then I pull out towels and we dry it together. Sometimes if they need a bit of encouragement I find the dry spots and pretend to try and keep it dry as they come at it with water.
- Laundry, if I have a lot of laundry to fold we have a laundry party. Everything goes into one big pile and we pull clothes out and throw it at whoever it belongs to. Then after the clothes are put away we pick a corner and use mated socks to have a sock war. Then we put away the socks.
- general pick up. I make this fun by playing games like I spy. I spy with my little eye something red, then they put away all the red toys until they find the one I was thinking of. We also have races, pick a number and pick up that number, or pull out a timer and see if they can get a personal best each time. I also try to have them pick up a small amount often so the job doesn't get to big or intimidating.
- I also use rewards on top of the fun. For every chore they get 10-20 minutes of a computer game or after each chore we play or read together. Breaking it up helps a lot.
So what do you do to get your kids to help out around the house? I'm always looking for new ideas and we love making work more fun around here.
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