Should My Kids Do Chores?

The question of “Should my kids do chores?” may bring many thoughts to your mind.  Maybe you grew up in a home where chores came with harsh expectations and words of anger.  Or perhaps you grew up in a home where chores were not expected of you.  Maybe you would love to have your kids do chores, but you don’t know where to start.  All of these perspectives are valid, but I do believe chores can be beneficial for everyone in the family.

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Why Should My Kid Do Chores?

Well, let’s start with the practical and maybe a tad selfish reason.  You, momma, are only one person.  Moms were not made to do everything for every person in your house.  You will run yourself ragged and probably end up feeling resentful and unappreciated if you try to do everything.  Sharing the responsibilities in your house will help keep your sanity.

But besides your sanity, chores are good for our kids.  I know they will never act like it is good for them, but these are life skills they will need.  How many times have we heard about the college kid that didn’t know how to do the laundry?  Our job is to prepare them to be independent and I don’t know about you, but I’m not coming to scrub their toilet when they move out!  Chores give us the opportunity to teach responsibility and what it means to be part of a team.  So yes, I am team Chores all the way!

What Chores?

But where do I start?  If you have not had your children doing chores before then start small.  Please don’t wake up tomorrow and give your child a list of ten chores to complete today.  That is a recipe for overwhelm.  Start with one chore.  Get into a good rhythm for a month or so, and then add another until you get to the level of responsibility you feel is appropriate.

As far as what chores to have your kids do, that will be highly individual.  Each house, personality, and circumstance will mean that no two family chore charts will look the same.  I will tell you what we are doing right now in this season so hopefully it will spark some ideas for you.  We have used chore charts in past seasons and you can grab an editable version I made HERE. 

What We are Doing Now

Currently, we have white boards on their bedroom doors and I write their chores on the white boards.  We have three main morning chores:  dishes, sweeping, and picking up the living room and kitchen.  Each week one of these chores is assigned to each of my three big kids and then each week we rotate these chores.  The rest of their morning list consists of things they need to do to get ready for school like brush their teeth or fill their water bottle. 

After school they are responsible for doing their homework, cleaning their rooms, and the oldest two practice piano.  On the weekends everyone folds and puts away their laundry and my oldest just started cleaning the bathroom at the beginning of every new month.  These are the jobs that are most important to us.  They can earn extra money by doing chores outside of these responsibilities too, but that is optional.  Again, this is what works for us right now in this season, but not an exact blueprint of what will work for everyone!

Now Step Back

For me this last part is the hardest!  You have to step back and let your kids be accountable for the responsibilities you have given them.  It is SO HARD for me to not follow them around and nag them when I see them wasting time.  I don’t want us to be late, after all.  But I am really working on stepping back and holding them accountable.

For us right now that means we don’t leave for school until our chores are done.  (Full disclose we haven’t actually been late to school yet!)  And we don’t eat dinner or have play time or technology time after school until our chores are done.  I am working hard on letting the system we have set up doing the talking for me.   UPDATE:  We now do our chores after school since my oldest has to be at school earlier for middle school.

But as a parent also be on the lookout for ways you can teach and instruct them.  I noticed just this last week that two of my children are really struggling to manage their time.  So for the next week we have I am giving them a time limit on each chore they have to do.  If they get it done before the timer goes off they get 10 points.  If they collect enough points they can watch a movie this weekend.  My hope is that they will learn what it feels like to focus on a task and get it done in a timely matter.  Wish me luck and I wish all of you luck too!!

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