Do you find that getting your children to help you clean around the house is more of a hassle than it’s worth? Here are a few ways that might help get them in the cleaning spirit.
- Give the kids an old pair of socks to wear as mitten dusters. Dampen the socks slightly and send the kids off. This is a great way to get baseboards clean!
- Shorten the handle on a broom so it is child sized. It never hurts to have an extra hand while sweeping.
- Better yet, buy a small vacuum that is easy to maneuver for the kids. My grandmother bought us a cordless, lightweight floor-and-carpet cleaner and my kids take turns vacuuming the wood floors while I do the carpets with the larger vacuum.
- Set a timer and have the kids pick up for 5 minutes straight. Offer a treat as a reward for a job well done.
- Try having the kids clean each other’s rooms. Sometimes it is more fun picking up someone else’s space rather than your own.
- Most importantly, let go of perfection! When the kids are helping, you will not get the same end result as if you did it yourself. However, it is important that they learn how to do these things. If a towel is not folded to your liking and you feel the need to fix it, do it later when little eyes aren’t looking. Don’t make them feel the job was done wrong when they clearly tried their best.
What are some creative ways you use to get your kids motivated to clean?
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I’m gonna try them all!
That video is hilarious!
Letting go of perfection is definitely a must. Who cares if you can see the tag sticking out at the bottom of the hand towel? In the end, things like that do not matter.
Thank you for this!
Kids don’t realize that cleaning is “work”. They think it is super fun. So thanks for the great ideas – start ‘em young, and they’ll just continue out of habit. We owe it to them to make our teenagers better family members. My son told me just the other day that his friends didn’t help out at all around the house. He does, because we have always valued his help, and felt it was our responsibility to teach him how to do such things.
My son’s allowance is not a ‘given’, but neither is it directly earned via a ‘price tag’ on each household task completed. He will be paid his allowance, provided he has kept up on his own small set of responsibilities such as cleaning out his lunch pack each day after school, keeping his room tidy, and being cooperative when asked to help out with various other small tasks.
Bigger tasks, such as helping to clean out the basement or car washes/clean out, window washing, etc. are offered as opportunities to earn a bit of a premium on top of his allowance.
Additionally, if he wants to spend some fun time with me, I tell him how much I’d love to! … and I’ll have time to do so, as soon as my ‘needs’ are done; would he like to help me with ___(kitchen clean up; laundry folding; whatever) ____, so that we can both get to the fun stuff that much sooner?
Works like a charm!
[...] the hanging items to their closet. Let go of perfection when they are young just as you would with cleaning, but fine-tune their skills later [...]