Spriggs Systems: Part 3 Chores

Here are a few ideas on chores/clean up:

Chore idea #1: Room Rescue

This is where they rescue their room from the disaster that has hit. We do this every night before bed. Sometimes we do it as a whole family going from room to room ***advantage is you don't get the "I didn't make this mess" because everyone is cleaning all the rooms. Also it helps equal things out if you have one room really messy and one not, otherwise someone is done really fast and someone else is working for a long time. I hope this is teaching helping others and building teamwork effort.

Chore idea #2: Make believe

Someone gave me this idea: play Cinderella and clean. Disadvantage: doesn't work so well with boys;)
I did a different make believe this week with Haley playing cashier. For example I had to go to the laundry mat and pay for my cleaning, then for hangers so I could put clothes away. Then I had to pay for my lunch at the "restaraunt". So I was doing my tasks but playing with Haley at the same time. We had fun that morning.

Chore idea #3: Timer

This is where you set the timer and they have to have an assignment done before the timer goes off. Advantages...it gets done in a timely fashion. Disadvantage...can cause anxiety in a child (would have to know your kids)

Chore idea #4: Music

An alteration to the "timer" in that you use a song to "clean up". Not the "clean up" song but a fast beat groovey tune to get you and your kids moving and things picked up quickly. Let kids take turns choosing the music or put together a cd of your favorites and turn it up and let it play.

Chore idea #5: Charts

Oh yeah....there are a million of these our there huh? I've seen some really cute ones and I've tried a variety and there is more I would try but for right now this is a chart I've put together that works well for our family. I like it because it has pictures for those not reading yet. I also like it because it still faciliates teamwork in that we all are working on one room a day.

Someone gave me this idea a couple years back and I made a chart and a friend of mine added some and now I've added a couple more. I used to do Saturday morning chores. But as my kids have gotten older and that is one day Dave doesn't work we decided that we didn't want to be spending that time just cleaning...but of course the house needs to be clean. So the solution was that you pick up everyday (room rescue) but the deep cleaning gets done once a week (okay...more than that you know because I have 4 kids but "officially" once a week) by doing one room a day. So your house ideally is clean all week but you don't clean the entire house all in one day. Does that make sense? If you take a peek at the chart you will see what I mean. Then I use clear magnets with their names on it to put over what chore they have that day. Now, the exception is the kitchen...that stays the same for a week because the kitchen has to be done everyday (3 times right?) This really seems to work well for our family because it doesn't take that long to do and the house gets cleaned. For me it's a win-win.