Children and "chores".

[Illbefinejustbloodyfine]

I have 2 boys, 8 and 9, and am a single parent (since they were babies) I just don't seem able to keep on top of the house. We def have too much stuff and I'm doing a pretty good job of decluttering. But I do feel like the dc could chip in on a regular basis. I was speaking to someone recently and he said he thought they were too young. I think it won't hurt them to have a couple of small jobs most days. And maybe a bigger weekend job, such as cleaning their room. I'm just wondering what is reasonable.

For context, there's one night where we are home late (7/8pm) and one night of swimming lessons, but otherwise I work school hours so we are home after school. We do have animals to look after (the dc play while I do the animal jobs, but they also help with feeding, grooming, playing with depending which animal)

So theres plenty of evening downtime. I plan to start with higher expectations of them tidying after themselves, toys, books, clothes, snacks etc often get left around. But not sure what sort of jobs are age appropriate. I am going to be following TOMM so was thinking they could do a couple of the daily jobs, like a quick wipe round in the bathroom. Run the hoover round.

Do your DC do designated household jobs? Nothing at all, ad hoc helping out?

Our daughter is 10 and has a list of their designated jobs that includes keeping her bedroom tidy (hoovering and polishing so properly tidy), putting her washing away (I wash and fold and leave on the bed), she makes herself breakfast in the week and sets the table for dinner every night. She has to do those and has had that responsibility for a couple of years now.

We also have a list on the fridge, which changes weekly depending on what we need help with, that she can choose to help with. We did have it as £2 per job but it took the value of actually wanting to help out of it because she’d rush the job and ask immediately for the money so now we don’t assign a specific monetary value to these but if she’s been making lots of effort to help with the misc jobs we are more likely to say yes to screen time, Roblox money, Starbucks etc and that’s motivated her a lot more.

These jobs include hoovering, polishing, wiping the mirrors, feeding the dogs, cleaning up after dinner, laundry, cleaning windows, gardening, dog poo pick up and the other day she helped me clean the fridge out.

I honestly found that being honest with her that I was feeling a bit overwhelmed with keeping the house running and would appreciate her help really motivated her to help.

Also I always try to be really specific with my praise and look at the job she’s done so she gets that proud moment.

“speaking to someone recently and he said he thought they were too young”

Who was this person? Do you value their opinion?

Of course they’re not too young!

@Drummend01 thank you, that's really helpful. I don't like adding monetary value either (no one pays me to do it!) But I'm happy to reward in other ways and praise. They're also saving up for a big purchase so I would give them a bit of that if they're trying hard.

@HappyNewTaxYear I do value their opinion, and wasn't expecting it tbh. Single man who lives alone and keeps his house spotless!