Tidying up troubles

[ariesalien]

Got 2DC - 5 and 2.
Tidying up (especially over the summer holidays) has become such a nightmare. They can get so many toys out in like 5 minutes when I leave a room and it can take HOURS to get them to tidy it.

It's making me feel so at the end of my tether with it and really testing my patience, trying not to lose my cool with them!

Any hacks to get them to tidy? DC2 will just tend to refuse and DC5 will reluctantly agree but take 1.5-2 hours.

Tried timers, bribes, consequences, rewards... I just don't want to resort to tidying it up for them!

How are you approaching it? If there’s a mess and you just say tidy it they won’t know what to do. They are very young. You need to teach them what to do.

Eg. Look the cars are on the floor, they need to go back in the car box.

Now let’s look at the books, they belong on the bookshelf let’s put all the books safely in their place.

At their ages yes you will have to do a certain amount yourself.

Dont bother with punishments or rewards. Just natural consequences. We want to go to the park, let’s get this tidied up then. If they don’t help you tidy then you can’t go out.

Don’t leave tidying till the end of the day. Do short bursts of it all through the day when you can.