I have a cousin, living far from me, who is a young Mom. (I hear about her kids through another family member who sees her often.) The Mom has 4 small children. As soon as each child is old enough to sit up, the Mom sits him or her on the floor next to the laundry basket. They have fun together folding the clothes and putting them in the basket. Since kids love to be helpful, depending on their age, she’s got them helping her not only with laundry, but also setting the table, cleaning up the kitchen, putting groceries in the pantry, putting toys away, etc. She makes it all fun too, never forces it or overdoes it. There are no chore charts either. Her children never think helping out is a burden, because their Mom is positive about it and they started helping at such a young age.  They laugh a lot while they are “working” and have plenty of play time. The Mom has more time to spend having fun with them too, because chores are more efficiently completed for the entire family.

clothesline

http://www.freeclipartnow.com

The best part of all this is that these are the best behaved children on earth. They are kind, polite and happy. And just imagine what greatly confident, independent young adults they will be!

This is a far better method than most parents used when I was a child – making chores a miserably negative, forced activity with high stress levels and bad moods among all involved.

Start early. Make it fun. Keep it positive. Something for all of us parents to think about.

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