Not so long ago, I posted a photo and caption about kids and chores, and a friend stopped by and left this comment:
My kids are only 5 and 2 at the moment but I’m trying to figure out how to help them grow from toddlers who always want to help Mom into older kids who (amazingly) still want to help Mom.
And I answered:
I’ve been thinking about this as well!
Yes, little kids love helping us. Maybe as they get older, they adopt our attitude towards chores: they are hard work and no one wants to do them. Perhaps we need to share how we love helping the people we love: “I love helping you.” “I’m happy to do that for you.” “I enjoy working with you.” “We’ve done a great job together!”
Also, maybe we need to avoid organising our kids and criticising the work they do. They must get very discouraged when we say such things as “It’s quicker to do that myself” or “You haven’t done that properly.” We can do this with adults too. My husband always makes our bed, and he doesn’t do it ‘my’ way. Sometimes I’m tempted to ‘fix’ it. But if I did that, I know he would think it’s not worth helping me.
That reminds me of something else. We have to let other people help us. We all say we want help, but then we sometimes try to do everything ourselves. My kids are always saying, “Can I do anything to help you, Mum?” I could say, “No, thank you.” But if I did that too often, they’d soon stop offering their help.
Kids are good people who genuinely care about us and want to help. Perhaps we assume we’re going to have to persuade them when that’s not necessarily true.
So what do you think? Does this make any sense? Or do you have other ideas? I’d love to hear your thoughts!
Photo: My husband Andy and our girls are washing the dishes. Even though Andy cooked the dinner, he’s still willing to help clean up after our meal. I think his generous attitude has been adopted by our children. It’s just as well they have the good example of one parent to follow. I wasn’t helping. I was too busy taking photos!
Hi Sue, chiming in from the northern shore of Lake Ontario, Canada??. I really enjoy your blog. I’m always amazed at the commonality of motherhood and family life,even across the globe. Thank you so much for all your wonderful posts … I just discovered your blog in January and the reposts you put up are very much appreciated:). On this particular topic of kids liking to help, I always enjoyed helping my older guys with their newspaper routes over the years, right into their teens, for the reason that I like modelling the idea that we all pitch in to help one another when we can. If I help them with “their” jobs, I feel they are more likely to naturally lend a hand to me when I’ve needed a hand with “my” tasks. We’ve never really had structured chores as much as we just each ask for or offer help as needed. I think structured chores work well for lots of people … ot just seems to have happened kind of naturally for us.
Erin,
It’s lovely to meet you! Thank you for your kind words about my blog. Yes, it doesn’t matter where we live, motherhood and family life connect us together.
Your comment about my reposts has given me a new idea. Perhaps I should feature some of my old posts on my homepage. I could dig out some of the more interesting and relevant ones and then change them every now and then. I’ll look for some suitable posts as soon as I’ve finished writing this comment!
“If I help them with “their” jobs, I feel they are more likely to naturally lend a hand to me when I’ve needed a hand with “my” tasks.” Oh yes, I agree!
Thank you so much for stopping by. I appreciate your comment!
Sue, totally agree with you about how important our attitude is. With 3 teens and a 5 year old, mostly happy to help when asked and even happier to step in and offer help when not asked, I’ve found my approach to tasks does seem to set the tone for how they might approach them too.
Seeing us get on with stuff without making a fuss or complaining all the time, using timers to make room rescues a fun challenge, impromptu dance parties while we wash up – they all help to make our homes happier places to be.
But along with that, for us we’ve found that when our children feel they have a genuine choice to help or not, that we’ll be okay with them saying no, and will respect and accept a no graciously (most of the time at least), that’s transformed our relationships with each other and all our attitudes towards housework.
When they know they really can say no and aren’t going to have it held against them or thrown back at them when they ask for help, it leaves them freer to actually say yes more. It’s like a gift to have opportunities to help because we really want to, rather than feeling resentful about being made to, and it keeps on giving for us and for them x
Hayley,
I love your comment about how children should have a genuine choice about whether to help or not. Just like they have a genuine choice in other areas of their lives. Unschooling is all about self-giving, isn’t it? Our children need opportunities to freely give to others. It’s wonderful when kids help because they want to, Much better than helping because they feel they have to!