Our society never fails to surprise me. Household chores like filling up groceries, stocking up vegetables, cooking, washing dishes, cleaning, laundry, and dusting are considered feminine.
While neutral tasks such as paying the bill or taking care of a car are supposed to be a males to-do. It’s high time to understand that household chores are not the job of a mom, wife or a daughter. It should be done by every member of the house. Doing one's own chores is what one is supposed to do. Doing laundry, making your own bed, washing your own utensil, cleaning your own washroom, organizing your own wardrobe and dusting your own room.Yes, these are our default responsibilities which we have been putting on the female's plate. Let’s get this right now. The best way to normalize the wrongly built pattern is to teach the younger ones about the importance of doing the household chores. Children can learn a lot from doing household chores such as:
Involving teens in household chores gives them the opportunity to become active participants in the house.
Teens begin to see themselves as important contributors to the family.
Holding teens accountable for their chores can increase a sense of themselves as responsible and actually make them more responsible.
Teens will feel more capable of having met their obligations and completed their tasks.
Household chores are the life lesson one should be aware of. This skill develops by working towards it. They are the evergreen skills always in demand for oneself.
This also develops fine and gross motor skills & planning abilities.
It Teaches them empathy.
After reading the above, the very next thing knocking your mind must be how to get this started. Don’t worry, we have covered this for you:
Communication is the key: Before getting started, it is important to brief your teen that why they should be doing household chores and what benefit it will bring to them. You can explain the importance of chores with certain examples like making your own bed gives the sense of accomplishment, leads to productivity, feeling of motivation for the entire day and that also improves the mood a lot. As a parent you definitely know what are the benefits of the chores you do, you just need to explain it to them wisely. But do remember that your teachings will hold a life long value in their lifestyle so do handle it with love, care and affection.
2. Brief them about their chores: As a functional house usually does have a lot of work to be wrapped up. Allocating your teen some chores should have some thoughts behind them. You cannot ask them to fix a broken tap or a broken electricity bulb. Do understand that for now they need to look after all those chores which do not hold any kind of danger. Below are some of the chores that you should be briefing them around:
Making their bed
Organizing their wardrobe and bookshelf
Dusting and cleaning their own room
Feeding the pet
Watering the plants
Drying off clothes
Taking out the garbage and recycling them
Babysitting the younger sibling
Setting up the table
Unloading the dishwasher
Washing the dishes
3. Set their timelines: While teaching them the household chores, it is important to look into their schedule. After you have a fair idea of how their day usually looks , ask them about the time they want to offer you help or complete their chores assigned. Of course some chores like making the bed and cleaning the room should be done as the very first chore after waking up but few chores can be planned. Decide how often you want your teen to complete their chores . Be transparent in terms of the time table. Stay organized with them, make a calendar for the same. So that they know that this is to be done before leaving the home for a football match.
4. Make them focus on the quality and their importance: Many of times just because yu teen wants to get off from the assigned chore they will complete the chore creating another chaos. Make them understand that there is a very big reason called organizing which plays a vital role in our life. If we, our home and our stuff are not organized then we will not be able to deliver quality and would constantly be in a bad mood because of the shortage of time. Hence to avoid such situations, it is important to stay organized and organization comes with sincerity and quality. So the very next time they discharge the dump, ask them to make sure that the bin is empty.
5. Plan a reward for them but don’t force the consequences: Okay let’s play cool here. You made a schedule for them for a good week. And thankfully they are able to keep up with all of the chores assignments. The next part that you should play here is to reward them with a small token of appreciation. Yes, a little appreciation never hurts and that too when your kid is growing. The rewards and appreciation builds their confidence and boost the motivation they have.
Wish you a very happy parenting!
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