Wednesday, March 25, 2009

My Top Tip for Organizing With Children

Tackling a messy room can be overwhelming for children. Give your child specific directions. Instead of saying “clean up your room”, try
  • make the bed

  • put your dirty clothes in the hamper

  • put the books back on the bookshelf
  • gather all your school papers into one pile

  • put your clean clothes away

By giving you child specific directions, you are also helping to break down the project into smaller, doable steps.

For more Works-For-Me Tips, visit We Are THAT Family.

8 comments:

Anonymous said...

Amen! When our oldest was little we started telling her specific things we wanted her to do. If it was too generalized she would not know what I expected of her.
Great WFMW.

La said...

Good advice! I'm still stuck making my kids' beds though because they have really high, awkward bunkbeds. (And because I'm a perfectionist.) Sometimes it's hard for me to let my kids do their own stuff, because it's faster to just do it on my own. But that's really not helping them, huh? Hmmmm......

La said...

Hey, you actually got the blogger comment box to show up at the bottom of your post. My blog will NOT cooperate with that new feature. =( Did you just select the option to embed the comment box at the bottom of your post or did you change the html? I'm oh so curious! ;)

Creative Junkie said...

LOL - I think this is great advice but unfortunately, I can draw my kids a map with a flowchart and they still don't get it.

Helene said...

I've been trying to break things down for my kids instead of being so general, like telling them specifically what I need them to do (pick up papers off the floor, put toys in toy bin, etc)...sometimes it works, sometimes not. It's hit or miss I guess!

Paula @ Organizing Tips For Moms said...

Helene,
Kids are that way. There really is no easy way out for parents. Overall, I’ve found that the one thing that does work really well for me is consistency. I have to keep my eye on the big picture. What is it that I’m teaching them? Kids’ thinking styles are different and play a role in it, too!

Meredith said...

Working with kids is always a challenge, but these are some great tips!

DairyQueen said...

great tips! I made a picture chart for my four year old to SHOW her what a clean room looked like. Now she knows not to tell me it's clean unless it looks like her chart. I did the same thing with her getting ready for her day. I posted them on my blog last week if you're interested in taking a look.

I found you from someone linking up to your closet organizing tips - can't wait to see what all I find here :)

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