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getting to housework
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I was hoping someone would have a few suggestions about how to fit housework into our day. We used to really do a great job of it, back before we did any real homeschooling. The boys (now 7.5yo) always helped me, more or less. But when we started adding lessons to our day (last winter) that bumped the time we usually cleaned. They wanted to do the lessons first and who was I to say no to that? So right now we have systems to keep on top of: kitchen, laundry, emptying trash and cat litter box, and tidying up and vacuuming the living area floor daily. So it stays rather alright as long as you don’t look too closely. But we don’t dust or clean baseboards or windows or mop or clean the bathroom or vacuum cobwebs from corners or sweep porches or clean bedrooms anymore. And I miss that being done.
I have a system planned where we start at the top of a list I’ve made and clean each room as it falls on the list, some each day (maybe 20-30 min) and ideally we’d do it all in a week but even if it takes two weeks to get through the list I’d be fine. Except that we don’t do any of it. I never do find that 20-30 minutes to clean the house anymore. We’re not doing excessive amounts of lessons (we also don’t do science or writing or spelling or memorization… 🙂 ) but still the time seems to be filled and when we have free time, cleaning doesn’t seem to make the cut.
You know how it helps to build habits if they are tagged onto something else that is a regular habit? Like taking your fish oil after breakfast, or flossing teeth after brushing. I feel I need something to hang this cleaning time onto. It used to be after breakfast but with lessons now in the slot I don’t know when to get it done. It isn’t like lessons are ‘over’ at a certain point bc we’re not organized enough for that yet. I’ve thought about after lunch but I am trying really hard (and failing) to have quite time for an hour then. We start out evening routine at 4:30 which is when we tidy up and vacuum, then name dinner and feed animals, etc. so the evening before-dinner slot is already full.
Any suggestions? I’d really appreciate it!
What about trying it in that after breakfast slot now and seeing if they’re ok with starting lessons a bit later? That is when it works for us the easiest.
Another thought – do you have a snack time midmorning or during the day sometime? Tag it on after that.
Other thoughts, depending on the children – do it BEFORE breakfast. Some people are more the wake up for a while before eating breakfast type, while others are roll out of bed and head directly to the kitchen to eat type. We’re the second type so chores first aren’t as great as chores after breakfast, but I know families whose children aren’t ready to eat right upon waking so they do chores first.
I guess now you might approach it as building the habit of housework. 😉 I would bump the boys’ routine of starting lessons first for chores (which is what we do here). The children get up and dressed, do chores (chicken care, dishwasher unloading/put away, etc.), then eat breakfast and do personal grooming. This takes about 1/2 an hour to 45 minutes. Probably 20 of thee minutes is for the chores. They get up at 7:00 and we start school @ 7:45. After dinner, they do other chores. This is their habit and routine. Same thing for me. I am in the habit of making my bed first thing in the morning and, if needed, giving my bathroom a quick once-over or starting a load of laundry before I come out for breakfast. During natural transition times during lessons, I juggle the laundry” from washer to drier. My children fold when school is over for them. When my children are doing independent work, I sweep the floor on days it is needed. I usually to deeper cleaning every other weekend for an hour or so.
CM had a subject called “work” where the children were expected to have jobs around the house. Some of these also count for handicrafts. Tell your children they have started their schoolwork when they help clean the house. 🙂 I also like to take a break if we’ve been doing sit-down stuff for awhile and let them burn off energy by pushing a vacuum.
Yes maybe trying it right after breakfast is worth experimenting with again. That’s my personal favorite for a routine but doesn’t seem to be for the kids. We don’t have morning snack and my youngest says ‘I’m hungry’ as soon as his eyes open so me requesting the dogs being fed before he eats is about all he can do before eating. I don’t eat until later (10:00 or 10:30 usually). Seems my boys and I have different intrinsic morning rhythms!
We’ve done this several different ways depending on the season of our lives.
For awhile we had a three story house and we did one floor on Wednesday, one on Thursday and one on Friday. This would be done after our schoolwork for the day and before anyone could have free time.
Other times I’ve divided up cleaning chores between the children and I and we would do it all on one day and it would usually take us several hours. Usually that would be a Friday or Saturday and schoolwork wouldn’t be included with that day.
This year we are extremely busy, so I’ve had to rethink this again. The kids all have designated areas that they help with every day and then cleaning jobs are spread out over the week. For example, Wednesdays are bedroom cleaning days which will include vacuuming and dusting. Thursdays are general pick-up and dusting, Fridays are floors and bathrooms. These get done in about 30 minutes before we start school. Then different weeks also have different focuses. For example, the second week of the month, the focus is on extra food preparation for getting some things in the freezer. The third week is kitchen cleaning!
We have also done it so that each child is in charge of a room or area in the house and needs to keep that area clean. Pick-up is every day and dusting and vacuuming are whichever day of the week they choose to do it. When we did it that way, the jobs were typically done after school and before free time.
Maybe one of these ideas will fit for you in the season that you are in.
I’m terrible w/fitting in little bits each day. They do daily have their personal grooming/make bed/dog care/clean up messes. They know to clean their dishes and put in dishwasher after every meal. We switch off nightly who cleans up dinner dishes. I do all the laundry, they just put their clothes away. Everything else is saved for Saturday. With myself and 2 kids working hard it only takes an hour or so. Of course, my two are older…so it might take longer for you…but it just works better for us to have ONE block of time for dusting/vacuuming/bathrooms/floors. If I know we”ll be busy on Sat., then we try and do it Fri. Just what works for us:)
I’ve given a lot of thought to doing the major cleaning on Saturdays but I have two problems with that. 1) I can’t get more than about 20 min of work out of the boys at a time so I’d end up doing work that, if spread out over the week, they would have done. And 2) I like to leave Sat and Sun for family time. That is when the time is free to do as the family wants. I don’t usually even vacuum on the weekend or cook if I can help it. We often do family work projects but that is more like landscaping or repair kinds of things, not regular cleaning. In my heart I’d like to have the house cleaning all done while my husband (esp) older children are away at work/school so when they return the house is welcoming.
The list I currently have for progressing through the house is basically a list of the rooms from front to back. It seems if we did a room or two each day, we’d be able to keep everything in tip-top shape with relative ease. Sigh. I’m going to write down the different time suggestions given and ponder each to see if I can find something that will stick. I’m afraid before school work is going to be the best option but it is hard to resist when a child says ‘Mama, can I read to you now?’
I get kids doing chores by scheduling it in the day. I have a chart like today my daughter (8) will unload the dishwasher, fill pets water, straighten and wipe down kid’s bathroom, & dust her room. She is scheduled to do her math assignment on the computer TT3 then she does xtramath.org, then chores and when they are complete she can play math games from easy peasy or jumpstart online, or just have free play. While she is doing all this for about an hour – hour and a half, I am working one on one with my son (7) doing his math, spelling, handwriting, grammar/writing, reading/vocabulary. So 8-9:30 ish 9-10:30 ish depending on when we get started. My son then does his xtramath on the computer and chores then free time and he does get more because he is younger and needs it by this time. My daughter can write quicker and read faster so her LA doesn’t take quite as long either. It works for us and I can usually geet in some science reading just before lunch. Hope this helps you. I loved doing religion first thing in the morning, but it just threw the schedule off, so now we do it after lunch, or I have my daughter read from the children’s bible while I prepare lunch.
We have before school, break time, and after school time slots for chores. It’s a lot of work establishing the habit, but it is certainly worth it, even if you have to set timers/reminders to help. Just remember that in order for it to become a habit, you have to do what’s on the list of chores when that timer/reminder lets you know IT’S TIME!!! ;0)
I don’t have a choice, it has to be on Saturday. I have the kids help in the morning and then the rest of the day and Sunday is theirs. I don’t try to do it all either so its not as clean as I would like but I have learned to live with it. I only pick one or two projects to tackle and the rest waits till next time.
I made daily checklists for my kids and put them in a frame with a dry erase marker so they can be checked off daily and then wiped clean for the next day/week. They have things they must do before breakfast daily, which are:
Read Bible
Make the bed
Get dressed
Unload the dishwasher
Help with breakfast
These are done daily, including Saturdays. We begin school immediately after breakfast. Afternoon chores are done after school but before lunch. Each day they have a different afternoon chore. Ds is 9.5; dd is 8. Their afternoon chores get a little bit done everyday so that we don’t fall behind in the basic housework. Afternoon chores are as follows for ds:
Monday: vacuum the living room, dining room, and kitchen (we bought a small, lightweight vacuum so as not to be unwieldy for the kids.)
Tuesday: Shake out all rugs and sweep the porch
Wednesday: wash your clothes and sheets, put away clothing and sheets back on the bed
Thursday: dust and vacuum your bedroom
Friday: clean up the backyard, vacuum the living room, dining room, and kitchen
Afternoon chores for dd are as follows:
Monday: clean the bathroom and empty bathroom trash
Tuesday: wash your clothes and sheets, put away clothing and sheets back on the bed
Wednesday: vacuum living room, dining room, and kitchen
Thursday: dust and vacuum your bedroom
Friday: clean up the backyard, wipe down kitchen cabinet doors and drawer fronts
They also have the option of completing chores from a list that I have assigned monetary values to.
Chores that earn them $.50 upon completion and inspection are cleaning baseboards in 1-2 rooms, cleaning blinds in 1-2 rooms, washing bathroom trashcans, wiping kitchen appliances.
Chores that earn $1.00 are baseboards in 3-4 rooms, blinds in 3-4 rooms, wiping out the utensils drawers and reorganizing them, watering the plants.
Chores that earn $1.50 include cleaning blinds/baseboards in 5 or more rooms, wiping the cup holders, dash, and seats in the van.
The paid chores are not mandatory, but if I need to give manual labor as a consequence for misbehavior, I will assign tasks from that list and not pay for them. Only when done voluntarily do I pay.
I usually do a quick spot clean of the bathroom on Thursday because we host a life group in our home on Thursday evenings. I am responsible for dh’s and my laundry, sheets, cleaning our bedroom, and vacuuming our basement. I don’t mop extremely often, maybe once every two weeks, but that is not something I schedule; I just do it when I see it needs doing. When needed, the kids and I will work together for 10-15 minutes to clean and tidy our schoolroom. We have a very large, 5 bedroom/2 bath home. Without my kids’ help, there’s no way I could keep it all clean!
Hope this helps,
Lindsey
(Typed this from my phone, so please excuse any strange spelling or typos.)
We do a morning routine (each child has an assigned job to complete after breakfast). That helps us get the house ‘together’ before our school day begins.
In addition to that, we have a cleaning rotation that we do right after morning school work (before lunch/playtime):
Mondays: Laundry & general clean up
Tuesdays: Bathrooms
Wednesdays: Shopping & Errands
Thursdays: Dusting
Fridays: Floors
We do very little housework on the weekends since we have one day to relax, and the other is generally full of entertaining or church responsibilities.
I am a little freaky about my kitchen and clean it a lot – that is why it isn’t assigned a day for cleaning. Kids have dish duty and kp after breakfast and after dinner.
I do also take time off of school to catch up on things like paint touch ups, window washing, etc…that is another reason year round school works for us!
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