Heather Barton

When my oldest was about 6 was when I started to realize I wanted to really crack down on the whole chores issue.  At that time my 3 boys were 2, 4 & 6.  I was getting lost of interesting kid toys catalogs and I found a little chart of what kids can do at what age and a chart to keep track of chores.   So I bought one and went online to discover what they could do and at what age they could do it.

In that first year I put easy chores on the chart that they could do.  Empty the silverware, make their bed, feed the fish (we didn’t have the dog then), etc.  They loved the chore chart (which now has double the spaces for chores on it as the picture because I added more with a Sharpie about 4 years later).  The chart came with 3 different color stars to put on the spaces when each child completed that chore.  It was mostly filled with Luke’s stars because as the oldest he loved it.  I put stars on each chore they did at the end of the day and we counted them all up at the end of the week and I gave them a penny a star.  Participants immediately got piggy banks to put their pennies in. 

Now to be clear, I had to supervise almost all of the jobs until the child doing them got comfortable with it.  Just a pinch of fish food, please, no…too much, no…too little, yes…that’s perfect.  Day after day until they got it.  Did this add to my work load?  Yes.  Did all my chores take just that much longer?  Oh yes.  Was it worth it?  OH YES! (see next blog)

The beauty of this system is the chores are dry erase.  I can change, reword, add to and remove chores as the children get older.  I can add chores like “Practice something” and “Make an observation in your Journal” or my favorite “Be Mom’s assistant”.  I will note that after two years I retired the “stars” because they stabbed under my fingernails every week when I took them off the chart (Ouch!) and switched to dry erase pens, where I entered little E’s, C’s and L’s every day.  Now they are old enough to enter their own chore accomplishments and when they don’t, guess what, they don’t get paid!

So the “when” answer is really, “Anytime”.  The real key is that kids change as they age and chores and motivations must change with them.  But the ultimate parenting goal remained the same:  teach them the value of money AND how to do all the household chores at the same time.

My personal goal…NOT to be doing any housework, cooking, etc. by the time they are 14, 16 & 18.  Hey don’t mock me…a girl can dream!  And boy can my youngest scrub a toilet.

A lot of people have different opinions about kids and money.  Should they get an allowance or not?  Should we as parents control what they spend?

When I was growing up we had chores and got an allowance.  It was a pitiful amount of money, our allowance.  So at the earliest age possible I got a job.  I was paid with checks.  I had to get a checking account to put it in and use it.  I then had to learn how to balance that checkbook (mostly because my Dad was an accountant and insisted).

What did I buy with my money?  Junk food!  My mom was a health food nut, but not until I was 6, so I had my sweet tooth firmly installed and then went into withdrawal for 10 years until I could afford to buy my own.  Ahhh, Sara Lee pound cake, come to me!  I swear during those years I put our local ice cream man into a higher tax bracket.  He once played Led Zepplin down our street because my brother gave him the tape!

So here I am with my own kids, deciding how to instill a good work ethic into them.  My parenting motto is “You are adults in training.”  With that in mind I realized my kids needed to know about money because it was necessary for adulthood.  I wanted them to know that everyone had to earn money to buy their desires.

Lucky me I ended up with 3 boys and after dating men who didn’t know how to cook, clean, bake, iron and sew (o.k. maybe they don’t need to sew) I wanted to teach ALL household skills to my boys, not just the exterior ones.   My fantasy goal was to do only 1/5th of the household work by the time the oldest was 18.

So suddenly I had two reasons to have the kids get an allowance; 1. Payment for work and 2. Education on correct household skills.  Oh, and the beautiful by-product of less work for me!  Now my brother does not pay his kids an allowance and we’ve had our discussion on our reasons.  He feels that as part of the household they need to pull their share without monetary justification.  I feel that is a noble thought, but that the real world does not work that way.  I think it falls into the category of enforced volunteering or charity.

Son- Why am I doing this, Dad?

Dad- Because you get free room & board and should help out around the house as appreciation.

Son- How about you pay me and I’ll buy my own food.

When a person chooses to do something it is out of the desire to be rewarded by something; money, gratitude, their own sense of fairness or justice or happiness or whatever motivates them.

When my boys were infants I always taught the older that if you want something you’re younger brother has, then you must either wait your turn or TRADE them for the item.   Because our world runs on Trade and we use money to do it.  As preparation for adulthood our children need to realize that and be able to work it.  Adding charity and volunteerism is an added bonus to shape their character.  But if all you teach them is charity and volunteerism and they go out there expecting the world to be run as rosy as their childhood where everyone is giving and fairly doing their share they will get a rude awakening.  Will they be able to successfully negotiate that raise?  Will they overspend and run up huge credit card debt at a young age out of sheer inexperience?

I want to prepare my kids for adulthood because I want to kick them out or into college at 18.  Yes and watch them flounder about but learn to swim because I gave them enough practice with the basics.   So that’s the WHY.  I’ll give you the WHEN and the HOW in the next few posts.  And you can all either cheer or laugh at me in 10 years…we’ll see then.