Turning Chores Into Habits
Entropy has attacked our chore chart. Left to its own devices, the tendency of any system is to descend into chaos, and after a month of inconsistent schedules, travel, snow days and vacation time, it was clear that our descent had more than begun. When we looked around after a particularly challenging bedtime at the end of February, we saw a kitchen full of dishes, homework strewn across the counter, unemptied lunch boxes, cat dishes filled but not set out for the cats and the coats and boots solidly obscuring the mudroom floor.
Is it some kind of universal late-winter failing; a junior version of unkept resolutions? Because all around me, other friends were saying much the same thing. Just when the parents thought the children were on board with whatever household chores they were assigned, snap! They walked off the job. One, using classic parent-talk, said her once-conscientious 10-year-old was “regressing.” Another thought it was a challenge — “just to see how much I’ll put up with.”
When I first started writing this post, back in February, I wasn’t sure what to do. I was basically trying new and creative ways of nagging: signs, hand signals, interpretive dance. My husband wanted to try the full Marmee: leave the children to their own devices as the house falls apart around them and eventually Beth’s bird dies (a famous moment from “Little Women”). But I work from home, where I would be surrounded by the hungry pets and dirty dishes. And creative nagging is less fulfilling than I hoped.
It has become an annual ritual, this reassessment of the chore chart and all that goes with it. In the past, I’ve blamed the system. I’ve blamed the children. Last year, I blamed myself (and my husband), writing about “Age-Appropriate Chores for Children (and Why They’re Not Doing Them). ”
This year, after a reading list that has included Gretchen Rubin’s “Better Than Before,” Christine Carter’s “The Sweet Spot” and Charles Duhigg’s “The Power of Habit,” I’m back to blaming (in part) the system. Sometimes my children don’t do their chores because they’re children, and they don’t want to do chores. Sometimes they don’t do chores because I’m doing the chores for them, and just like dogs that smell fear, my children can spot the minute I’ve conceded that it is easier to do it myself than to get them to do it.
But one big reason they don’t do chores is that our system doesn’t make it easy to remember what they need to do, or when they need to do it.
The wheel rotates, and every week, a new set of chores is yours; just when you’ve become accustomed to feeding the cats at night, it is your turn to feed the dogs in the morning. If the goal is children who automatically do the right thing, this is exactly the wrong way to go about it. Habits are formed when you do the same thing at the same time again and again, and one way to create a new habit is to tie a new goal onto an old routine.
So two weeks ago, I replaced our turning wheel that rotated chores by week with a revised chore list that ties chores to daily events. When you come downstairs in the morning, you do your chore. When you walk in the door after school, you empty your lunch box. When you get up from dinner, you do your chore. Right now, we agreed (with one outlying minority vote) to keep the same chores monthly; there’s some chance we will assign some or all permanently.
It has been remarkably successful thus far. There have been days when I have not had to remind a single child to empty a lunch box, and while the after-dinner nagging continues, it has diminished. As a bonus, I’ve found renewed energy to ask for more help. In general, if I’m working in the kitchen or doing other housework, there ought to be children working too.
What works with you when it comes to children and chores, and have you had any success in turning certain chores into habits?