Help
With Your Rule
Motivating Little Children to Do Their Chores - Options?
Dear Holly,
Your note on apprenticing children struck me. My parents used to just spank me alot. Given what you are talking about, here is a question I would like your input on. My two older children, ages 5 and 3, complain every single time I tell them it is "tidy time". While the timer ticking worked a little for my 5 year old son, it didn't take away the initial complaints. My 3 year old girl is very reluctant, and even down right defiant about it some times. I could always force her to do it, but I don't want to fight with them every day over this. It is so simple and usually only takes about 5-10 mins.
Labels: 4th P Parent
posted by Holly at 7:32 PM
1 Comments:
Part of 'apprenticing' our children involves looking at our own lives, what we as adults do to motivate ourselves, and then try to put these in child terms.
When you were a kid, how did you feel about chores? What helped you do your chores well? - what virtues did you try to adopt that made your tasks worthwhile? What rewards followed chores that you looked forward to? (or on the other hand, what fears did you have if you didn't do your chores, like your parents spanking you...)
As an adult, how do you feel about chores? What do you do to motivate yourself? How do you motivate yourself about life in general? Do you live your life based on what you want or what you ought to do? How do you handle tasks you hate to do? How can you share this motivation with your children?
Knowing the answers to what works for you will be the easiest way for you to train your children, because it will come from your heart and your experience in the same types of situations.
But also, if we look at the Catholic faith, God models a way or two for us:
On earth, we know we have a weary task at times and that this isn't heaven! We don't always want to do it. But we look forward to eternal life, and know that if we're faithful to our goal, it'll all be worth it - there is something outside of the chore of life to look forward to - a reward or consequence - heaven or hell.
And until we come to an intrinsic understanding of the beauty of work and a deep relationship of love with the Lord where we WANT to please him in all things, it's going to be that "end result" which helps motivate us, albeit we will still do it with complaints too!
Now if we take this, and apply it to our children - they don't want to work - it is dreary - they can't understand the beauty or dignity of what they are doing - the chore itself holds no delight. How, based on God's model, can we inspire them until they reach an age where they do it for virtue's sake alone, because it is in itself a "good' thing? Follow God's model - there is a consequence - and the positive consequence works best.
For me, I always attach chores to a pleasant task to follow "just after". If I have a nasty task to do, often I say to myself - "Well, I'll grab a coffee when I'm done", or "When I get this tidied, I can do x,y,z when I am done."
For our family, Morning hygeine is followed by breakfast (food is a good thing!). Kitchen clean-up in the morning is followed by free time (toys for little ones). I usually place most chores around meals - before meals and eating is the result! or after meals and free play is the result. The results don't happen until the chores are done.
For our weekly clean-up, there is always a Movie Night with pop and chips. At this present time, my oldest children have taken on the weekly clean as a paid employment - the 'reward' is built into their work.
And I have always said "Attitude counts! I am not rewarding a bad attitude!"
Then I encourage them to think positively, to get determined, to do it well and quick so they can be proud of themselves, that they are pleasing God - WOW!
I give them verbal thoughts to think to encourage them, and hold the up-coming pleasant experience foremost in their minds. "Hurry up! Let's get it done well so we will be finished and we can have our snack!"
On a final note about this, I found that scheduling certain times for chores helped too - made it a routine so they expected it. I wasn't always calling them to do chores, nor interrupting their play time.
And, I also would 'warn' them, so to speak, based on my recollections of being commanded to change my activities in a split second - like when I was studying
at university and my mother would call for the rosary - right now! Nothing bothered me more - being immersed in something and then I was just supposed to disgard it on a whim! So, I let my children know in advance that in "10 minuntes" we are cleaning up; in "5 more minutes" we'll be cleaning up; in "Just a couple of minutes now, be ready to clean up". I found this helped too - their minds were prepared, not jolted by a command.
Hope this helps in some way. God Bless!
Post a Comment
<< Home