We had been struggling with the boys on getting them to do their chores. "Mr. K, can you please work on your chores?" "No, thanks. I don't want to do my chores today." "That's not really an option. Remember how it's a house rule that you need to help out with your chores?" "I don't want to do them." It was a frustrating battle day in and out. So Andrew and I held a family council and prayed over what to do. And an answer came to me.
Our answer may not work for everyone, but it has absolutely floored me how well that it has been working for us. As in, within three months, they didn't finish their chores 7 times. Three of those times it was because their chore reward from the day before was no chores, and at least once it was because we were gone all day. So, basically, that makes three days out of three months that they didn't do their chores. If the days get too crazy once a month for boys to get chores done, I can handle that. This has worked INFINITELY better for us than the daily struggle it was before.
Our Answer (The Chore Reward System):
While we were talking, I suddenly remembered something my third grade teacher used to do. Occasionally, I don't remember what we did to earn it, we got to pick a clover off of the wall. They had things like "5 extra minutes of recess" or "Eat lunch in the classroom today" or "Better luck next time" on them. We LOVED picking them! I realized this could work as a chore reward system (although we don't have "better luck next time" as a chore reward).
We broke it into groups:
Weekday Chore Rewards, ones we could do on a school night during the week or on Saturdays when we had something going on, such as the boys going to visit their grandma.
Saturday Chore Rewards, ones we could do when we had more time as a family to do something fun.
Lastly, More Expensive Chore Rewards: these were the "rare" chore rewards where we could budget to do something fun as a family. These were only possible to draw on Saturdays, because ONE Saturday would have a "pick a (pot of gold, or whatever object we used for it that month)" and we had more chore rewards in each category than were possible to draw. So far, two of the three months we have done the expensive chore reward. This month it didn't get drawn.
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| The Chore Rewards for April. The Easter Eggs are the regular weekday chore rewards, the bunnies are the weekday chore rewards, and the Easter Baskets were the expensive chore rewards. I made them all visually different so that the boys would know which ones they could pick. The chocolate bunny was because we had something special planned one of the days of this month and it could only get picked on a specific day (one of the boys' birthdays). |
For March: Three Leaf Clovers, Four Leaf Clovers, Pots of Gold
April: Easter Eggs, Easter Bunnies, Easter Baskets
May: Raindrops, Clouds, Umbrellas
June: Flowers, Birds, Sunshines
How can we afford to do this? Simple. I adapted the chore reward system to us in particular, making use of things we could go and do for little or free. For example, the boys have Pass of All Passes, so we put Trafalga in as a Saturday chore reward. We have fun kids board games, so we will let them pick which one we all play together that night. Super fun for the boys and free for us. Awesome! Plus it helps us make sure we are scheduling time together as a family to do fun things. On top of that, I just made a budget for it. I would write out all of the chore rewards before the month they would be in and then write down how expensive they would be and then budgeted for them.
The catch with this system is that in order for us to do some of the chore rewards, we have to have enough time before bedtime. So we set a hard time limit that, if they aren't done by that time exactly they don't get to get a chore reward that day. That helps them with not dilly-dallying about doing their chores; they want to get them done in time! Also, the first person that is done with their chores is the one that gets to pick the reward off of the wall. Everyone who finishes their chores within the time limit gets to have the reward, but only the first person done gets to pick the actual reward off of the wall.
Really quick I'll give you what we do for chores and then list a sample of chore rewards for those of you that may be seeking ideas.
Chores:
I made chore charts for the boys using charts I found online for age-appropriate chores for their specific ages. I adapted things each month to come up with a system that works for us.
For us, the boys have every day chores, weekly chores, and "Ask Liz" chores. For their everyday chores, it's things like picking up their clothes and toys, making their beds, and reading/going to school/doing homework. Each week they also switch off who helps clean and set the table and who helps feed the cats for the rest of that week on their daily chores. Their weekly chores are things that only need to happen once a week. For example, I give them a cleaning wipe and they clean off their toilet seat in the bathroom that only they use, or they help with vacuuming their bedroom and the stairs (I have a small handheld vacuum for the 5-year-old; he helps with the stairs).
Their "Ask Liz" chores have adapted a lot. It used to be something I planned out ahead of time, but I have changed it to something where they have to come up to me and ask me for another chore. I look around me, find something that needs to be done that day (like helping water the plants, using glass wipes to clean the bathroom mirrors, or playing upstairs quietly until lunch time to give me a moment to recollect my sanity).
Overall, they have six chores every day, six days of the week (we don't do chores on Sunday in our house).
The one disadvantage to this is I have to constantly be helping them figure out what their next chore is and then checking them off, which makes it harder for me to get my own stuff done. But hey. They are learning how to help out around the home. I am raising boys that will help their wives at home, and if that means the dishes have to wait until they are in bed, I can deal with that.
Chore Reward Ideas:
Regular Chore Rewards:
(With some of these we do multiples. For example, we might have four Regular Chore Rewards that have "Make a Treat Together" on them, but we only have one option for "No Chores Tomorrow". Find whatever works for you.)
- Ten minutes of a video or computer game
- Play a board game together (Your choice)
- $__ Allowance (we have switched between $1 or $2 - we took them to a toy store before this, too, to help them find something they wanted to save up for)
- Piece of Candy (we still have candy left over from Easter)
- Pick a candy bar from the store (we limit them to $1 each)
- Make a treat together
- No Chores Tomorrow!
- Ice Cream / Rootbeer Floats
- Story time! (the boys were not a fan of this one, so we cut it out since we were doing reading with them as a chore anyway)
- Craft time
- Pick one chore not to do tomorrow (The boys didn't like this one, strangely enough. They're an all-or-nothing bunch, I suppose. We figured with the no chores tomorrow they didn't get to pick a clover that day, but with this one it got them one chore closer to picking a chore reward.)
Saturday Chore Rewards:
(We always do more possible rewards on this than there are weekends, that way it isn't guaranteed that we will do the expensive chore reward. You are free to do differently in your own home.)
- $0.50 Allowance per Regular Chore Reward earned this week, $5 if all possible Chore Rewards were earned.
- Pick an expensive chore reward
- Go to Trafalga
- Go to Kangaroo Zoo
- Outdoor Scavenger Hunt
- Feed ducks at the park
- Go out for a treat (we took them to Purple Turtle for a milkshake when we got this one)
Expensive Chore Rewards:
(Again, make sure you budget for this and plan ahead so it's something you could really go do together as a family. It's our way of fitting a family outing into our schedules once a month. We only have two per month for them to choose one of, but I will list several of the options that we have done.)
- Nickle City
- Bowling
- Color-Me-Mine
- Go to the Rec. Center
- Go out to the movies
- Classic Skating
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