The Proven Way to Get Your Kids to Help Clean Around the House
As a mother of two young children, cleaning upward everyday messes tin can exist a chore. Hither's how to stay in control of your business firm while having fun with your kids.
At the cease of the day, my living room often looks like a microburst has come and gone. I suspect it erupted somewhere effectually the couch area, picked up everything plastic and primary colored, and distributed the items wherever they made the least sense, similar the hallway or kitchen floors.
This is life with a ane- and 3-year-old. I'm used to enervating, bargaining, bribing and deep-sighing my way through the make clean-upwardly process nightly. My older daughter is smart—too smart—and will counter my request for her to clean up with her own sweetly asked inquiry: "Will you help me, Mama?" Of course I will, though I end upwards doing all the work!
And so when my friend Alissa, a swain mom of two, told me well-nigh something she's named "The Clean-Up Blitz," and how information technology gets her kids to become super-powered toy-picking-upward machines, I was sold. Her kids are 7 and 11, but she assured me it would work on even the littles.
Cue the music
The showtime thing you need is music. Per the name of the game, the soundtrack for this is the '73 hitting "Ballroom Blitz" past The Sweet. You've heard it.
Next, prepare 15 minutes on the timer (or 5, if they're really little similar mine and have the attending spans of butterflies). Tell your kids you're nigh to play a game called The Clean-Up Blitz. Act amped. This office is important. Yous need the free energy of a sports announcer during some really big sporting event.
Tell your kids they have xv minutes to put away as many toys, books, backpacks, homeless socks or discarded pieces of string cheese every bit possible. This game works best if you tin can pit ii or more kids against each other. If you're merely working with one kid, congratulations; you get to be the competitor. The goal is to pick up the most things. The person who picks up the nigh things—wait for it—wins.
The count is arbitrary. It's going to be articulate who is putting along the almost effort, and y'all get to make that phone call. It probably goes without saying, but this game works ameliorate with a prize (say, homemade fudge pops) at the end. I used a single animal cracker. You lot'd think they were playing for a Corvette. My kids are hands pacified.
Start yelling
What makes this game successful is the frenzied pace and volume level. I started the time, turned on the song and cranked the volume. The cat hid. My husband and I yelled, "Become!" and began simultaneously shouting directions.
"Grab the dolls! Put them in the toy box! Grab your blocks! They go in the bag! Hurrrry! Go! Go! Go! One minute left!"
It lit a fire under my three-twelvemonth-sometime. With a huge smile on her face, she ran crazily effectually the living room grabbing objects and throwing them into, or at least near, her toy box. Meanwhile, my 1-year-former was simply enjoying the excitement, dancing in a circle and clapping her hands, unaware that she was, in fact, very much losing this competition.
When the timer went off, we all complanate on the floor and I looked around—it was shockingly bare. Sure, it wasn't perfect, but it was significantly tidier than when we started. Most important, my iii-year-quondam had laughed and smiled through the whole affair—not a unmarried complaint or protestation had escaped her lips! She was even more pleased when we deemed her the winner and bestowed upon her a cracker shaped like an otter.
Take a turn
I asked my other girlfriends to try it out with their kids, most of whom were a scrap older, and the results came dorsum positive—the Make clean-Upwards Blitz propelled their kids frontwards into action. For some, the competition aspect was the biggest seller while for others, the silliness and the song made the chore fly past.
I'll tell you lot a secret. After seeing the success information technology had with my kids, I began putting a timer on my own chores and playing Clean-Upwards Blitz for one. I gave myself v minutes to unload and reload the dishwasher. I pretended Pat Sajak was off to the side with an envelope ready to run into if I'd won a Ford Fiesta. I've never organized forks faster. It was silly, but it broke up the monotony. And I definitely won that Fiesta.
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Source: https://www.tasteofhome.com/article/the-proven-way-to-get-your-kids-to-help-clean-around-the-house/
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