Here is what I have used in the past and it worked well at the time: I made each child a set of index cards with their name and one chore per card, chores that were done morning and night got a card for each occurrance (ie brush teeth, morning; brush teeth evening). The set of cards included both daily chores and chores that were done periodically. Since my children were very young at the time I made the cards very specific (ie instead of one card saying clean bedroom I made dust bedroom, vaccum bedroom, etc). I then found a shoe organizer at the dollar store, the type that has little pouches for each shoe and you hang the whole thing in you closet or on a door. Each pouch was labled either morning chores, afternoon chores, evening chores, finished chores and each child had one row of pouches. The whole thing made a 4x3 grid with each child having a row and each column being either morning, afternoon, evening, or finished. (Does this make sense?) Then I took the index cards and placed the chore into the appropriate time slot pouch. When they finished a chore the card went into the finished pouch. Each night we would reset the cards (it only took a moment). The chores that were done periodically I would put into appropriate pouch when needed, otherwise they were kept seperate. Daily chore were always to be found in one of the pouches. We had three chores that rotated daily between the three kids. For these chore I made a spinny-wheel thingy. It was a circle that had been divide in to 3 wedges, each child's name was in one wedge. Then there was a smaller circle that rotated in the center of the larger circle. This smaller circle had been divide into three wedges and each wedge was one of the rotating chores. So each night when we reset the index cards I would rotate the chores' circle one space so that each chore would move to the next child. This whole system worked very well. All I had to do was to say, "Go do your morning chores" and they would get out their morning chore cards and do the chores in any order that they wanted. Once a chore was done it went into the finished pouch. Having the cards in their hand helped in a lot of ways. They could quickly see the progress they were making, and had the power to decide for themselves what they wanted to do next and what still need to be done. They could also carry the cards around so they didn't have to constantly go back to a list on the wall. The only real draw back was that sometimes cards would get left laying around. When I had done this my children were between 3y and 8y. I used pictures as well as words on the cards so the younger ones didn't have to read (or ask me to read) the cards. It took a little while to make the cards, but it was all reuseable and the kids loved to remind me to reset it each night. You could even make resetting the chores card one of the evening chores. After a while they got to where they relied less and less on the card to tell them what to do at each point in the day, it had become a habit. I hope this helps, if you have any questions about my descriptions just let me know. It was really easy to do, it is just a bit difficult to explain in writing.
I did the same thing Melanee did. Weekly and daily chores. I even added Get the Mail because that is one my kids really fight about - can I get the mail? was solved - finally! I make a monthly list on my spreadsheet thing on the computer that rotates the jobs week to week. The only one I tend to dominate is laundry. I can get it done faster just folding it as I take it out of the dryer. I also put a mark on the washer and dryer with red nail polish so the kids would know without me there where to put the knob to wash or dry clothes. My 9 yodd just recently really started helping me because she is FINALLY realizing how much I have to do. We live on a 20 acre farm. There is a lot to do. I started paying her 5.00 a week for her help - to keep her interest in helping even though I feel as a family that we should take care of each other and the home. She has to help me without me telling her to do it. She unloads the dishwasher when she gets up. Then feeds the dogs, cat, goats, and chickens. Helps when she sees a need - like getting the clothes out of the bathroom. Keeping her room clean. She share with a 6 yo sister so she has to clean up after her sometimes(we are working on this one). They have a list at their door of things they should do in the morning before school. We start school after breakfast and after outside chores. I don't always remember the charts, but they are a start. The 4 kids are learning to do things like clean the bathroom properly. I was wondering if I had dropped the ball because they don't even seem to be able to keep their rooms clean! I have the 2 boys in one room and I have lately begun to get things out of their room until they can keep it clean. The less things the easier to keep clean I figure. So far that is the only thing that has worked. They have turned their interests to other things anyway - why keep things they no longer need? I am rambling and need to finish breakfast! Sabrina
