When all the children were REALLY little...
As with general tidiness, there was a time when I would clean the house mostly on my own. This worked best when all my children were very young. I would clean the whole house every Monday, and give the children various little jobs to help out. I would spray a cloth with a homemade cleaning spray, and give them a list of things to dust, or have them wipe the windows. My goal was to keep them busy (and therefore out of messes and trouble) while I was busy, and also to teach them responsibility. After they finished their work, I rewarded them by letting them watch a video, a rare and special treat for them! While they watched the video, I finished up the cleaning. The rest of the week we just tidied or cleaned up messes as needed.
Household jobs that do not need done every week are called “focus areas,” because I only have to focus on those tasks occasionally. Focus areas include such tasks as washing windows, cleaning out the pantry, or spot cleaning the carpets. I would work on these focus areas in spurts after my regular Monday cleaning was complete, or as I was able to get to them later in the week, often when little ones were napping and my oldest daughter was busy with independent school work. I would try not to plan on more than one or two focus areas in any given week; otherwise it was too overwhelming.
This worked great for our family at the time, but like many of our household systems, we outgrew it. As the children got older and more numerous, the cleaning demands became more frequent, and my time to do it became more scarce due to homeschooling and other added duties. It became necessary to add some more structure to the housekeeping, and involve the children more.
When we needed more structure...
To achieve the added structure and participation of the children, I began to work on implementing a “chore chart.” I first made a list of all the basic housekeeping tasks I did each week. Next to each task, I wrote the name of the youngest child that I felt could handle that particular job. After playing with the list a bit, I gave each child one or two chores for each day of the week, which could be completed in approximately 10 to 20 minutes a day. The remaining jobs would be for me.
With that information in hand, I made the chore chart. I started a new document in Microsoft Word, and made a table with eight columns across the top, headed “NAME, MONDAY, TUESDAY, WEDNESDAY, THURSDAY, FRIDAY, TIDY SPACE, and MEALTIME JOBS.” Along the left side, I entered my own name and the name of each child. I then assigned the tasks in each block. I tweaked a bit here and there until it was just right. I highlighted each row with a different color so each child can find his or her own tasks quickly, and taped it up to our pantry door for all to see and refer to often.
Some of the chores only need to be done every other week. For this type of tasks, I typed in one of the weekly chore blocks something along the lines of “Week 1: clean out desk, Week 2: dust-bust van.” The children can easily remember which chore they did the week before.
On the chore chart, I designate certain days to work on focus areas, but I do not write in specific focus areas tasks. As I notice something that needs done, I simply make a mental or written note that I need to give some upcoming “focus area” attention to it, and work on it on the next focus area day. This plan provides some amount of structure, but also some much-needed flexibility for our family.
If you prefer more structure for focus areas in your home, here are a few ideas:
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Schedule a room to focus on each week, and go through a rotating schedule. Week 1 could be “Living Room,” and you would thoroughly wash down, declutter and organize your living room that week.
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Have a rotating schedule according to task. Windows one week, walls the next, decluttering the next, organize bookshelves the next. Kitchen organization is a hefty project that deserves it's own week.
- For any of these rotating schedules, you could make a list of each focus area and the tasks involved in each one. Simply go down the list from week to week, or use the list as inspiration, and choose which one you feel needs the most attention at the present time.
