">
|
Well, if you've been following my mini-saga of getting my life under control, you know I've been trying to get our chore system overhauled. I'd ordered Managers of Their Chores by Teri Maxwell, but it took me over a month to actually read the material, and set up the nifty chore-packs. For once in my life I wasn't skipping to the middle of the book, I actually read it all first. And now I'm doing the happy-mom dance. Can I just say...I speak about 100 fewer words in the morning now???
I set the packs out in the morning.
Inside each chore-pack is an individualized list of that person's morning routine and a chore or two...
For pre-readers (or kids who just like the pictures) they have this pictorial version. You can customize and choose what picture goes in. Each card is numbered, and after they do the first card, they slide it to the back of the pack and do the next thing.
The chore-pack clips onto the clothing as a to-do list that goes with them.
While reading all the way through the book wasn't absolutely necessary, Teri Maxwell has written a thorough treatise on the virtues and value of chores as a key ingredient in bringing up children to be competent adults. Our life just is running a little more smoothly having the family engine run on teamwork. Another plus is that the kids know what to expect. While I heartily recommend the Maxwell's material, the little badges can be found at Office Depot, and one could easily write down on some cardstock with pen your own list and not spend the money on their package which includes the book, 4 chore-packs, the cardstock and access to creating your personlized chore library online with the software they've developed. The software took you through all the steps pretty easily. Now our chore success isn't guaranteed. I know I have to follow up and do quality assurance checks. Cuz these kids are way too smart. They'll ditch the packs in a heartbeat if they figure I'm too lazy to tell them what to do and too lazy to check if they did it or not. So, I'm not out of a job all together. But my job's definitely a little nicer! |
And this is really nice, because I like to be a quiet morning person. The kids with their little chore-packs on are like little quiet robots (OK, not really robots--that sounds rather impersonal, but they're doing what their chorepacks say!!) going about their to-do list routine. I'm NOT asking, "Did you make your bed? Go get dressed. Brush your hair, have you fed the dog? Don't forget your dishwasher unloading. You're breakfast dishes today. Will you take out the trash?" So far so smooth. 
Comments
|
|
|
|
|
Posted by
|
|
|
|
|
Posted by Emily
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
Posted by