to just let a 8 year old have a messy bedroom

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sick of nagging, tried alsort of rewards[bribes] but sick of it tbh

I did. I said I wasn't doing it anymore. No reasonably tidy room = no pocket money. It took a month of attrition but we're there now. If I cannot hoover on Friday there's no money.

Dunno. I only have preschoolers but I hope not to allow that. My mum gave up on me and I lived in squalor and hated it but didn't feel able to tidy it somehow. She also never taught me how to clean or gave me responsibility around the house, and now I'm a slattern who my mil judges. Make it her responsibility but help her and use carrots and sticks.

I find it too much to let my dd have a messy room.. her friends cannot play in it, the cat gets lost, I tread on too much lego etc but I also could not be arsed with moaning and doing it for her so I bought a lot of storage and then 'streamlined' the toys down to a much lower level. I labelled all the storage as to what should be in it and gave her a desk to play on to limit what goes on the floor and that is much better. Now at 6pm each day we do a room check and then once a week when she is not there I go through and move the lego out of monster high boxes etc just to keep on top of it. Would that work?
If not maybe a condemned sign for the door and forget it exists ? They are so messy!

I do. She has to tidy it eventually when I need to clean, but it's a complete pig sty again within 24 hours and I just shut the door and ignore it. It's not worth the hassle nagging and it's her room so she can have it how she wants.

My sister was the same, I was the tidy one. Guess who's house looks like a show home now?

I can't stand a messy house so wouldn't work for me.

To be honest at 8 I wouldn't have expected mine to keep their bedroom tidy without help. I made/make my teens tidy though.

My dd is 7 and her room always looks like a bomb hit it. Recently I took about 3/4 of her toys out and put them in the attic and told her that until she can keep the smaller amount of toys tidy then the can't have all her toys back.
It hasn't really worked except that it's quicker to tidy her room.
I used to get really worked up and make her tidy her room every night before bed but I just leave it now and we do it together once a week. My dd is very disorganised and finds it hard to focus on tasks.

I insist on clothes being put in the laundry basket and remove dirty pots. I usually make the bed and open the curtains, occasionally DS (8) will do it but I usually have to remind him and I often do it while he is at school. I insist on a path from the bed ladder to the door being clear and when the mess is bad I make him tidy it before friends are allowed round which seems a good motivator. I sometimes use a timer - do as much as you can in 10 mins for example. Looks a lot better for not much effort. Every so we have a good go at it together or I do 10 or 15 mins to clear the floor so I can hoover.

8 year olds need help to tidy their bedroom? Incentives yes, help no. Unless they already have hoarding issues. My sister lived in squalor and could never be ready on time as a result. Its about life skills and self resepct. Declutter her room, get her some plastic storage boxes, do one session with her on what goes where/establish expectations: then incentivise if it doesnt happen. By that i mean rewards if its tidy, consequences if its not.

It's her room. Just shut the door. But make sure she knows you'll help her if she wants you to.

My dd is 8 and I get so depressed walking into her room, it looks like she's been burgled!

I leave it as long as I can bear, every week or so she has a half hearted attempt at tidying but she gets distracted and it's so bad it's just overwhelming for her, so she doesn't know where to start.

A lot of it is clothes she gets out and wears once, but don't need a wash, they end up piled on her bed, floor everywhere but in the wardrobe.

Every couple of months I go in and help her get it organised, spending 3 or 4 hours clearing out bin bags full of crap (mcDs toys, old magazines, parts of toys she doesn't use any more) but it would be a lot easier if I just helped her out for half an hour once a week.

She's not allowed food in her room so there's nothing too minging in there, just mess.

I do with my dcs. It's their responsibility to tidy their rooms, as long as most of their toys are out away that's fine, it has to be spotless on Thursday nights as I blitz upstairs every Friday, anything left out gets thrown.

They aren't too bad at tidying, though do need telling over the holidays.

When I was about that age my mum would tidy my room, whether it was already tidy or not, when I was at school and I hated it, I could never find anything and hated the thought of someone going through my stuff.This is partly why I leave my dcs to tidy their room and partly because I was fed up of spending Fridays cleaning and tidying from top to bottom for them to come home from school and trash it. Now it's partly their responsibility and they are slightly better.

My room was always hideously messy. My mum isn't particularly tidy but tried many strategies. Several times I got home and find my possessions in bin bags. She nagged/bribed/cajoled. A once a week tidy was instigated where I'd just chuck stuff under the bed. Once I was a teenager I had cups, plates, towels, several moudy cups scattered around. It was a proper health hazard.

Yet from the day I had my own house I became miraculously tidy and now all that remains of my former self is my messy car.

My dds are messy but at the moment I'd rather tidy it myself than risk it becoming like my old room. Not sure what I'd do when they are older though!

I have really, really tried to take a hands-off approach to my kids' rooms but they are such slobs that I normally just break and clean it myself.

I think if you do allow them to live in self-imposed squalor, you've got right on your side. I just don't have the constitution for it.

We've always done that - isn't that what doors are for? The only rules are a) no food - we don't want infestations and b) he must tidy and clean it if he's having friends to stay. We're even easing up on that one now as he's far more likely to take notice if his friends complain than of us.

It doesn't mean he doesn't have jobs around the house - he does.

My 9 year old keeps his room tidy!

Depends how much it bothers you.
My teens live in squalor, as they are old enough to make that decision for themselves. I regularly offer to help them sort it out, but won't 'do it for them' until I eventually snap about once a year.
From what I read on here though, many people would just 'itch' and not cope knowing there's a mess behind that door.

8 is a bit tricky, in that I think at that age they still often need direction, or the job breaking down into smaller 'bites'.

For me, untidy if fine so long as it is contained within the room.
Where it crosses a line is the point at which it becomes so untidy it is impossible to clean and then becomes DIRTY.

Untidy is fine, dirty is not.

I can't bear a lot of mess. Its just not necessary. My 6 yo DD is expected to keep her toys tidy and make her bed. My 4 yo DS is expected to keep his toys tidy. We have a huge clear out ever 6 months or so. I would expect an 8 yo to be able to keep their own room tidy to some degree.

I wouldn't allow it. If they can't keep it tidy as too much stuff you need to get them to get rid of most the stuff. Too many clothes, toys and crafts stuff can make it a pain to clean

Why are people so bothered about someone else's bedroom?

If the bedroom is in my house, then I'd prefer that it be clean. I don't much care about bedrooms outside of my house though.

I'm messy, my 8 year old is worse. I can hardly tell her to tidy up when I am a confirmed slattern

Hak - because in my house I like everywhere tidy and clean. I wouldn't want a room full of ants and dirty plates. Dirty underwear left about is unecessary. Also in our situation the bedroom would be shared so it's disrespectful to the other person imo

My 8yo basically has two large surfaces (chest of drawers tops) which he can put whatever crap half finished Lego models and other projects on that he likes. The rest of it needs to be tidy ish, you get it out you put it away kind of thing. No food allowed in there, water drinks only.

There is a place for everything and I do insist on stuff not being left all over the floor every night. It only takes him a few mins to tidy and he does need telling a couple of times before it gets done. But we allow enough time for it, as part of the bath/bedtime thing.

I hoover randomly with no routine, and I've explained that if any Lego goes up the hoover as a result of him leaving it on the floor, it will be him opening the hoover bag at the end of the month to get it out again!

6yo DD on the other hand, is a messy horror! Dressing up clothes, my little pony bits, books, shopkins, any tiny little figure she can get out and leave out she will!

Probably going against the grain here but I'm making sure my 8 yr old tidies her room. When dd1 was 8 we had bedroom woes and I gave up, thinking that it was her room and she could have it how she liked.

Fast forward 10 years and her room is an unhygienic midden. She's disorganised, never on time, it smells and she is unable to ever get on top of it. She even says herself that she wished she'd learned to be more tidy and organised when she was younger. She struggles to get any sort of order with things - be it revision or getting up on time for work. In all fairness she is getting better slowly but it's an uphill struggle. She has no respect for anything and never looks after anything properly, and tbh we hate buying birthday or christmas presents because you know that they'll be trodden underfoot as soon as she gets them in her room. Even stuff she buys herself is not looked after.

I'm keen to instill better values in dd2 so we've been hot on room tidiness from an early age.