Thursday, February 4, 2010

Our Chore chart

So, we've been through a few editions of chore charts with my kids.  Some have worked better than others.  My last attempt was a huge failure, so I was feeling the need to do something new again.  My kids are very visual learners and the younger kids can't read yet, so I wanted to do
something with pictures. 



I decided to use pictures of the finished chores as the visual reminder.  We have pictures of each of the kids rooms all cleaned up, their laundry baskets in the laundry room, each of the rooms downstairs, the dishwasher all emptied out, and another of it filled up.  We have one of the table all cleared off and one with the table set for dinner.  You get the idea....  I collected pictures for a few days to get them all.   I have pictures of their daily chores as well as chores that are done once a week.  I then printed them out, laminated them, and put velcro on the back of each.  What I'm having the kids do is take down the picture when they have finished that chore, and put it on the kitchen table.  They then also take a silk flower and put it in the container on the table. 



The idea is that everyone can see what has been accomplished that day and it makes our home beautiful!  In addition, if they do all their chores, they can have dessert after dinner.  So far the chart is working great, and I'm so glad to have the kids help around the house.  Its getting harder to pick things up off the floor with this baby in my way.  :)  Oh, one last note, I used to try and mix up the chores so that no one had a "bad" chore for more than a week.  That was part of my great failure with the last system.  So for this round, I've told the kids they have the same list of daily chores everyday for the next year.  Goose HATES touching dirty dishes, so I gave him the chore of emptying the dishwasher when its clean.   Tank is easily distracted, so I have her doing 2 small areas in the house instead of one of the bigger ones.   Like I said, so far so good, they are learning how to keep their specific zones clean and I don't have to worry about teaching them a new zone for a good long time.  :)  

One last picture of a to-do list that has been helpful... I don't know about your house, but my house can turn quickly into a chaos zone in the mornings as we get the kids ready for school.  I decided I needed another list of what the kids need to have ready before they go out to the bus.  I put the list in one of those frameless glass frames...  It has a back, and glass, and just little clips to hold it together.  Anyway, it works great as a dry erase board! 

 

The kids like to use the dry erase markers and they can see their progress as they get ready for school.  No more walking out the door without a snack or without the hair being combed.  :)
Anyway, I hope you don't mind my bragging/sharing.  :)  I've been happy with the improvement in our system and wanted to share.   Maybe it will help some of you in some way. 

6 comments:

Katie said...

Hmm. . .Good ideas. I really like the flower idea. It is so sweet. I am always looking for new ways to get my house running in a more organized way! Thanks!

Kristi said...

Your amazing! I love the idea of taking pictures of how you expect things to be done. Hope it all works out.

Kim W said...

Great ideas! I just wanted to ask, is this what you were talking about when you said you were "playing" yesterday. Cuz although this is really cool, it doesn't really equate to 'play'. ha, ha!!! Just joshing!

Unknown said...

Haha! You aren't going to believe this! When I saw the picture of the silk flowers on the table, I thought FOR SURE that it was the battery activated silk flower that would dance when people would talk to it! Do you remember this flower? We had it when we were kids. I want to say that it was Lynell's originally. I was feeling totally jealous that you had this AWESOME flower and then I continued to read through the post to find out that it wasn't the amazing dancing flower. However, it is still an awesome idea :)
I remember Dad designated me to always do the dusting around the house. Good Plan on keeping them to one chore! I hope it continues to work. You maybe should add to the morning off to school list "Homework". It was always the worst when you did your homework and then forgot it at home. P.S. One last comment...it seems to be that no one goes to school with their hair done or their shoes on? ;)

Julie said...

Great ideas, thanks for sharing! I'm glad I'm not the only one who has tried and failed at various chore charts. I will have to try the flower idea, too, I really liked that one!

Tami H. said...

this looks awesome! Thanks for the insight and great ideas!!