Mom’s Life By Rebecca Ingram Powell

Kids and Chores

teacH your cHilD important, everyDay life skills.

LIvING IT!

Take out the trash!

I stared at the overflowing trash can and slowly exhaled. Then I called my kids into the kitchen. Nodding my head in the direction of the stuffed trash receptacle, I asked, “What’s wrong with that?”

“With what?” My youngest, a 10-year- old boy who outgrew Trash Man long ago, stared and shrugged his shoulders.

“What are you talking about, Mom?” For my 12-year-old son, whose brain cells temporarily are diverted by yet another growth spurt, standing in the kitchen has reminded him that he is hungry. He completely missed the trash problem once he spotted the refrigerator.

© Getty Images

Their 15-year-old sister sighed with an air of superiority. “She’s talking about the trash, boys,” she announced. “It’s full, and no one has taken it out.”

I then began to explain to the children the real problem. Instead of someone — anyone — seeing a full can and taking care of it, all three had just continued to stuff in trash. Each one was thinking that eventually someone else would come along and empty the trash can. The real problem was laziness. It was a “ not-my-job” mind-set that was wrong.

MY fRIEND SANDY always has taught her kids to do chores. From the time they became toddlers, she had them working with her, learning how to do all of the necessary jobs around the house. She paid them one penny for each task they completed. Sandy knew she could do the work more quickly herself. She knew most of their friends did not have to do chores. But Sandy always was looking at the bigger picture, and she said simply, “I don’t care to raise sloppy adults.”

Author Patricia Sprinkle agrees, with one exception. “I never use the word chore,” she notes. “I use the word skill. Keeping a house is a skill. Preparing nutritious meals, doing the laundry — these are skills that children need to learn.” Sprinkle, author of Children Who Do Too Little believes, “When moms do not teach their children these skills, they are crippling them for adulthood.”

Teaching children how to take care of themselves and their home should be every parent’s goal. According to Sprinkle, learning housework and home maintenance is critical knowledge for the business world as well. “They learn responsibility,” she notes. “Doing these tasks teaches kids how to apply themselves to work they may not especially enjoy. It helps them understand that some jobs must be done whether you feel like it or not.” So where do you start?

Start early

My friend Debby was an amazing new mom. Her modest apartment always was neat and tidy, even after her baby came along. How? “Ashton does my chores with me,” she explained. From the time her daughter was only a few months old, Debby would place Ashton in her carrier for 30 minutes every morning, taking her along as she went through the apartment. Talking or

© Super Stock

Help your child learn to serve with a Christlike manner by reminding him of three things.

• Attitude counts. “Render service with a good attitude, as to the Lord and not to men, knowing that whatever good each one does, slave or free, he will receive this back from the Lord” (Ephesians 6: 7-8).

• No complaining allowed. “Do everything without grumbling and arguing” (Philippians 2: 14).

• Work glorifies God. “Therefore, whether you eat or drink, or whatever you do, do everything for God’s glory”

(1 Corinthians 10: 31).

38 PARENTLIFE MARCH 2008