In the busy world we live in it is hard to find the balance of chores, homework, extra-curricular activities, and free time to just play.  I believe chores do make children more responsible and less entitled.  But, it is not as common for children to be raised on a farm where they have to work in order to eat.  So many of their friends are not held to much expectation except maybe to go to school. Some families are so over scheduled they aren’t home to do chores anyway.  There can be a lot of whining from kids that parents just don’t want to deal with.  Sometimes it is easier for mom to just do it herself.  What’s the answer?  I don’t have all the answers but I can offer a few ideas that have worked for us over the years.

There are many chore charts and reward systems out there to explore.  I encourage you to explore them all!  I have found that I have to change it up often for my kids.  It helps to motivate them to do chores for me again.

We started with simple things when they were young.  Melissa and Doug make a fun little magnetic chore chart that you might like with little pictures and simple tasks.

My younger kids also really enjoyed a bead jar. We picked up some aquarium rocks that people put in vases because I wanted something heavy enough not to tip the container over easily but also big enough that kids wouldn’t be swallowing them. I also wanted them big enough to fill a jar fairly quickly because a toddler has a hard time waiting very long for a reward for chores. Every time they obeyed or did a chore they got to put a bead in the jar. When the jar was full we did a family activity together. This encouraged the kids to work together for a family goal and was useful for toddlers that don’t understand money yet and already have too many toys.

As they got older and enjoyed the computer more we loved using http://myjobchart.com/. This free website lets you set up chores for your kids and assign a point value. Your kids can go online or use the free app on their device or yours to mark that they have completed a task. Once they reach the points you have assigned for the week you have the option of rewarding them with different things, including linking to your amazon account to help them buy a toy, with your permission of course! We really enjoyed using this method before a trip to Disneyland several years ago. We agreed that we would buy them a souvenir at the park according to how many points they earned. It worked like a charm.

In recent years, my friend introduced me to plexiglass. Not only can it be used like a white board, but it can easily blend in with your walls and is lightweight to hang with command strips. If you use white board markers, it wipes right off. If you use permanent markers you can go over the writing with a white board marker and then it will come off too. This made a handy way to have a cute decoration on the wall that was actually a useful chore chart.

When school started for my kids we invented the term mini chore. They hated doing chores everyday and there really are some household chores (like cleaning a bathroom) that only need to be done by the kids once a week. Still, it helped to have the routine of them doing daily chores, but they were overwhelmed with homework and the amount of time away from home at school. So we told them they only had to do small things durning the week and called them mini chores. It’s stuff that can be done in two minutes or less, like emptying the garbage or rotating laundry. They know they are quick and don’t mind doing them to earn their media time.

Most recently my kids have been interested in earning money. I don’t think kids should earn an allowance just for existing. That is not how real life works. Kids should work to earn money. Learning to earn and save money is definitely an important life skill. So I decided to add money earning chores to our regular chores. Saturday chores and mini chores as well as keeping up their personal space are all requirements for living in our home and getting certain privileges. But, there are some extras that can earn them money. I decided to keep track of their earnings with a tally chart so I only had to pay out when they have earned enough to make it worth running to the bank for cash. Each tally is worth a quarter and the chores have money assignments. They aren’t required to earn money. It is up to them.

We used this method for our most recent Spring break and it really helped our staycation be fabulous!

It will be interesting to see where our chore adventure takes us as the kids become teenagers. Do you have some great ideas that have worked for your family? Please comment below and let us know!