The Journey Towards Home - From Mess Maker to Home Maker

2006-Mar-13

Getting Children to Help

Posted in trainning children
Children and Chores - As you can prolly tell, this is a favorite subject of mine. I was never taught (or made to) clean my room or other areas of the house. As a result, I formed a habit of NOT cleaning.

I became a Christian in college (my husband is the one who led me to the Lord) and after becoming a wife, I learned that keeping a house was part of being a godly woman.

Much to my horror, I realized that the habit of not cleaning was really a habit of LAZINESS (let's call it what it really is). I had become lazy. It wasn't just that I didn't know HOW to clean, I just didn't WANT to clean. And the perfectionist in me which said it had to be done right or not at all was also rearing it's ugly head, preventing me from cleaning my house.

So I have a LONG way to go in becoming the keeper at home that I should be. And I want to make sure I am being a good Titus 2 mother and trainning my girls (I have three - ages 6yr, 4yr and 2 1/2yr) to be keepers at home.

I am sure we have all ready that as soon as a child is able to get a toy out, he is able to be taught to put it back. And as soon as the child can walk, have them walking around WITH you, participating in ALL that you do.

Well, I did PART of that (and am now realizing how much of the WHOLE of that I should have been doing).

I notice that the chores I had my 6yr doing when she was first able to walk, she does joyfully and cheerfully now. It is the other things that I thought I should wait on letting her help with that she has already developed a habit of discontent with (like sweeping and mopping the floor).

With my 4yr I slacked off so much on having her help or do ANYTHING around the house (mostly because I was so busy training and working with her older sister) that this child is the most difficult to get to do ANY keeping house cheerfully.

With my 2 1/2 yr, I started REALLY early. I am doing things MUCH differently. She participates in EVERYTHING Momma does (even the trainning of her other sisters). Now, when she hears me open the dishawasher and comes JOYFULLY RUNNING to help unload it. I really think having the dishes in the pantry at a level she can work with REALLY helps. She also LOVES to help set the table.

This morning, with the laundry, she had her pile of clothes. Usually I have the 6yr fold the 2yr clothes as well as her own. But today the 2YR took the shirt off the top of the pile, brought it to me and asked me to fold it. After I folded it she ran it into her room to put in her dresser drawer. She came back into my room, asked me to fold the next shirt in her pile, and off to her room to put it in her drawer. Somewhere in the middle of the pile she started "folding" her own clothes and putting them in her drawer until all her clothes were "folded" and put in her drawer. SHE WAS SO HAPPY! And I know that I am forming a habit in her. A GOOD habit.

My husband was forced to do a lot of housework when he was younger. He grew to hate Saturdays because that was cleaning day. Mom and Dad would leave and have some alone time and the children were left to clean the house by themselves. When Mom got home, she would crticise everything they had done. They learned to do poor jobs just because they wanted to give her something to complain about instead of nitpicking all the hard work they had done.

I have seen how this affected my husband. And there are two rules in our house:
First - Nobody works alone. When I clean, my children are cleaning too. And when they start cleaning, Momma starts cleaning. Whether it is a 15 minute tidy up, or vacuuming and dusting, we do it TOGETHER.

Second - Saturdays are for FAMILY! I have worked hard to create a schedule that allows us to clean (and keep the house clean) throughout the week, so when the weekend comes (our only itme with Daddy), we are able to spend it doing fun things TOGETHER.

Notice how both rules end with the word together. I did not notice that myself until now, but it is true. Not only does the work get done faster, but it is more joyful when you do it together and feel a needed part of the family.

I also make it a point to NEVER redo my children's work. Sometimes I will encourage them to do a little more cleaning (what a great job! can you find any spot's you missed when you were cleaning/sweeping?). They get big smiles on their face and usually find their "mistake" shortly and clean it up. And I don't refold their clothes for them (thankfully they wear mostly dresses which are hanging in the closet so there is not too much wrinkling going on with the way the younger one's fold their clothes.

Today, as we were putting away laundry, my 6yr proudly came in and told me she had a surprize for me. She showed me her drawer (where her clothes were almost perfectly folded). She had put all her shirts in one area of her drawer, all her panties/stockings/bloomers in another area. Her whole drawer was ORGANIZED! I NEVER taught her to do this, and had not asked her to. Just one of the benefits of getting her started early.

And thank God for front loading washers and dryers. Being so pregnant, I cannot bend over to load/unload them. But all there of my children gleefully come running to help load or unload or take the clothes from the washer and put them in the dryer. And a special treat for the best helper? They get to take the lint out of the lint trap!

Chores is not a "dirty" word in our house. It means times of fellowship and fun!

My children can usually be heard making up their own songs and singing while they work (even recently my 6yr has started doing this while SWEEPING!). Some other things we do to make it fun can be read on this article which is on my homeschooling blog. You can also see pictures of my online scrapbook by following the link to the right hand side (which says PICTURES).

Anyways, I pray that this really encourages you to have your youngsters help out around the house and get them started early. I am truly amazed at the difference in my own children (how already the 4yr has developed a habit of laziness and a discontentment towards cleaning and keeping house). I am just thankful that she is only 4 and there is still time to train her properly (before she gets to be 8 or 10 or 12 and refuses to clean because the habit has had longer to form and is more difficult to break).

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