With proper training and instruction, children can be capable of so much. I think sometimes parents underestimate what their children can do. We say they are “just kids” or “they should just play.” You’re only little once, right? So, they should be allowed to live it up? However, if we don’t teach them to work, how will they ever learn responsibility? Do we just hope they’ll be hard workers once they graduate high school? Do we plan on teaching them how to do their own laundry right before they leave for college? The truth is, they will spend most of their lives as adults so they must learn HOW to be an adult.
One of the first steps to teaching them responsibility is chores. Today, I am going to show you how we do chores here.
Miss G started doing chores when she was three years old. Of course, she was only capable of a few things and she wasn’t always good at them but she did them. She started with helping me unload the dishwasher, fold wash cloths, and put away her own laundry. Now she is 7-years-old and she has learned so much since then.
This is the chore chart we started using when she was 6.
She has a card with her name on it and she moves it to the chore or task she is currently working on. Obviously, she was the only child doing chores at the time so she didn’t need her name on her chore card but she thought it was neat. (I turned the card upside down so it wouldn’t show in the picture though.)
The chart starts with her morning routine which is: go to the bathroom, change clothes and put away pjs, brush your teeth, fix your hair, and eat breakfast. This was very helpful in establishing a strong morning routine with good habits.
She moves on with the rest of her chores during our daily chore time.
Each chore is written on a notecard and slid into her pocket chart. She doesn’t do EVERY chore EVERY day. So, the chores she needs to do are facing out and the chores she can skip are turned so the plain back is showing. After I wrote each chore on the card, she drew an illustration for it which was extremely helpful before she became a good reader.
Here is a list of age appropriate chores for 6-7 year olds that are on her chore chart (with explanations):
Empty the trash (in all three bathrooms and take to trash can outside)
Unload the dishwasher
Grind coffee (we happen to be coffee lovers and she LOVES to grind!)
Recycle (take recycling out of container in house and put in bin outside)
Fold Clothes (and put away)
Weed plants
Clean bathrooms (meaning wipe sinks and counter tops)
Feed Dogs
Water blueberry bushes
Clean school room table
Vacuum (I tell her specific rooms to vacuum. She uses her own little stick vacuum that is easy to handle.)
Dust
Make Tea
Sweep sidewalks (She actually uses the electric blower now. It’s much faster and way more fun.)
Bake (This isn’t really a “chore.” She loves to see it on her chart and Daddy likes blueberry muffins on the weekends.)
Make beds (This doesn’t happen all that often. I make my own bed but she likes to do it sometimes. I don’t get worked up about the kids’ beds being made because they play on them and mess them up anyway.)
Wipe kitchen table and vacuum underneath
Bail pool (This is a summer time chore. After the kids have played in the kiddie pool for a couple days, we bail it and use the water on our blueberry bushes.)
Treat! (She gets a treat for a job well done! A treat could be hot tea or coffee time with Mama, a piece of dark chocolate, a homemade treat we have around, painting time, etc.)
I Googled age appropriate chores for 6-7 year olds to see what we might be missing on our chart but I didn’t come up with much. Here is what I found:
Sweep the kitchen floor
Mop the kitchen floor
Rake leaves
I like to clean the kitchen floor myself and we don’t rake. We live in the woods so raking would be INSANE. We do use a blower to get the leaves off the porch and Miss G does know how to do that. It gets included on her chore chart in the Fall and Winter.
I have done each one of the chores on her chart with her so she knows how to do them correctly.
With her helping out around the house, we are able to get things done faster and I don’t (usually) end the day frazzled. She is a hard worker and a BIG help.
My Little Man is three years old and likes to help his big sister do her chores. She explains each chore to him and teaches him how to do it correctly. He now has his own green card on the chore chart too!
If you want a pocket chart like ours, here it is on Amazon for about 15 bucks:
Carson-Dellosa Publishing CD-5601 Original Pocket Chart, 31″ x 42″, 10 Rows of Pockets, Blue
*This post contains affiliate links.