How can you keep a house clean when there are 4 kids (2 under 10) and only one parent?

Question

I need a lot of tips

Answer 1

It isn't easy is it? I was a nanny, a third parent of sorts but also the most responsible for things like this because parents worked away from home so much...often I felt like a single parent.

One way to look at it is that with a lot of kids, you have a lot of mess-makers but also a homegrown cleaning crew.

First thing I will say, without going into huge detail...is declutter your house. Too much stuff equals too much to clean and more to clean around. Pare down to what you need/love/use. You don't have to ship it off to goodwill or have a sale all the time. If you have storage space, you can consider dividing your collections and rotating them in and out of storage. This brings your stuff to a fraction of the total items available...and a fraction of stuff to keep up with and make messes with. Kind of makes the whole worst case scenario more manageable.

For the stuff and spaces you use everyday, get organized! Store things near the point of use, store daily used items in front, eye level for the user, on top of stacked or nested items, on surfaces. For things that are used weekly, put them nearby, a little harder to reach but still easy access. For stuff you use within a month's time, store behind, under the pile, up high or down low.

Another general organizing principle is that everything needs to have a home, and everyone knows where everything GOES. It is one thing how particular you are about whether everything is always in its place...but you don't have a chance if there is no definite place to begin with. If the item doesn't have a home, it may as well just keep laying there...how can you tell if an item is OUT of place, if there is nowhere to say it is IN place? This keeps kids from helping out because once they are told to put something away, they don't know what to do with it.

Teach your kids to do what they can that is age appropriate, and work together to accomplish more in shorter amount of time. Check into child development levels to see what your kids can do. For instance even a toddler can pitch in with picking up own toys, sorting colored socks, picking out jeans or towels to make a load, helping you stir or open and pour food out of its container into the pan.

Getting the kids involved is essential for many many many reasons.

Teaches them how to do stuff, often an academic lesson as well as a life skill...such as laundry sorting teaches colors, and measuring teaches math.

Teaches responsibility and respect for stuff and space as well as other people and the work it takes to run a home. If they know what goes into keeping the house clean, they are more likely to keep things nice.

Teaching time is also a great way for the teacher and the student to bond and learn about each other. You can do some teaching for quality time and when one kid knows how to do something and the other doesn't, delegate the teaching to someone else. It gives them a sense of real pride. One thing about teaching anyone to do anything is that it is a great chance to praise the child for learning something new. This teaches independence, willingness to try new things, and self-esteem and pride all around.

Brings a family closer together...teamwork, common goals, etc.

Gives them a way to contribute to the family's well-being. This is a way of keeping your "flock" together and teaching the children that their help and their involvement MATTERS.

To keep kids involved, you can use a chore chart with a reward system. There are so many ways to do this, and it is so well-covered other places I won't go into it here. This does NOT have to be about money. Your thank you's might be enough sometimes, and praise is reward too (those stickers really boost the pride). In addition, use something extra special after so many stickers, etc. Rewards like special time with you, dessert pick for the night, sleepover with a friend, extra time after bedtime, extra tv or computer time, etc really work better than punishments, and really give that extra incentive to do the right thing. And so it should...when you work hard and make the right choices, something good should happen of it.

You can also try to make things fun...gathering laundry can become a basketball game, for instance. Other chores can be competed as a race against each other, or you can all work together against the clock, even during commercial breaks while you watch TV or a countdown till a show is on. Other neat timers? CD's that really help you boogie down. Dance and sing, let it be loud time with frequent breaks to shake your fanny and high five each other.

You cannot cannot cannot NAG to get things done. Teach the skill, then lay down your expectation, give one warning, then out comes the hammer.

You also cannot cannot cannot go back and redo things that the kids have done. This teaches that the kid doesn't really have to do anything because you will just do it anyway and devalues their help. You don't hurt kids feelings when you critique their work in an encouraging way, praising the effort, offering ways to do it better, and sending them back for another stab at the job. When they fix their own mistakes they are solving their own problems. It is actually a self-esteem booster. Then you can say how you know it was hard, and you are proud of them for doing such great work. So suck it up, set your standards at a reasonable place (your house certainly doesn't need to be perfect) and let their work be good enough if they do a good job for their age.

You need to teach your kids, lastly, to clean up behind themselves. Clothes in the hamper, games and toys put away, making beds, toothpaste in the sink, dishes to the sink.

Some general quick clean principles:

Stack tasks:

Start a machine before you clean by hand. Laundry, dishwasher.
Start "soaking" and come back to it after easy clean items are done...toilet bowl, crusty dishes and surfaces, carpet fresh.
While you are in one room: Either do everything in one spot before you move, or do everything you can with one product at a time.

Work top to bottom to keep dust, etc from above from falling onto clean surfaces below.

Put catchall containers in every room. This isn't a clutter catcher, this is a temporary stash for out of place items and a way to move them all at one time when you are putting things away. Do this daily just before bedtime routine kicks in.

Put wastebaskets in every room.

Answer 2

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Answer 3

get the kids organised. hang hooks by the back door that they can all reach. designate a place for toys to be put when they are done playing i.e a toybox in the livingroom, back in their rooms etc. or impose a no toys in the livingroom rule. try a reward system and give each child a chore. the littler ones can help the big kids do the vaccuuming and dusting. one can also collect the stray laundry from everyones bedrooms. for every chore they do together without any issues give them a point and then when they get so many points reward them with a pizza and movie dinner night or something else they like to do as a group. good luck.

Answer 4

Make it a "group" effort. Each older kid is buddied with a younger one. Divide chores up and have one or two for each day. When you come home from work, ask if the chores got done. If not, give them a little more time to them as YOU DO YOURS. Show them that it's not always fun, but necessary to keep a neat and clean house. Also, make sure you gush over them when they do them without being told! Maybe rewarding them by letting them pick out dinner, or being excused from one chore next week, etc..

The big thing is to instill pride as a "family" for your home. And building their independence and sense of accomplishment, no matter how trivial...

Good luck..

Answer 5

Give them a weekly allowance of a few dollars to provide incentive for them to clean. Also turn chores into fun games for them. And encourage competitive spirit among the kids, so that whoever finishes cleaning the fastest or gets the most chores done, gets some sort of a reward (ice cream, an extra hour of TV, letting them go to a friend's house, etc). It's nice when you can get kids to help out of of sheer good conscience, but let's face it, most kids these days frown upon doing chores and the only way to motivate them to do them is by bribing them.

Answer 6

Make sure every item has a "place" Use storage bins, etc... to keep things in order. You have to teach your kids to always clean up behind themselves! Less is more - - - Get rid of any clutter and keep only things you need (not want) Every time I buy and item - an item has to leave the house. If you have anything you haven't used in over a year or two - get rid of it!

Answer 7

Assign the kids chores, and restrict their tv/video games, etc. until the chores are completed. Maybe make the chores worth a certain number of points and make a chart or something to keep track of points and let them cash in the points for things like a pizza night or getting to pick a movie to rent or something.

It's never too early to start teaching your kids how to be responsible for themselves and their belongings. Their future spouses will thank you =)

Answer 8

Everyone cleans their own rooms and is responsible for getting their laundry to where it belongs. Mommy doesnt go searching for your soccer shirt, so if you dont put it where it belongs, well looks like you're wearing the dirty smelly one now arent you? Everyone over 4 can put away their own clean clothes too. Use a crockpot for dinners and there are fewer dishes. At night everyone cleans up. Set a timer and assign a task to each child. Little ones pick up toys, etc. Everyone helping makes it quick work.

Answer 9

I think making a choir into a game would be interesting for that age group. Example: Who can make their beds the fastest? How can fold their clothes and put away the most neediest? Maybe give them an award for effort. Make a weekly chart. Put stickers & small awards for them so they have something to look forward too. What ever you do. DO NOT award them with food. I was an obese child :(

Answer 10

Well, first off, give the older ones a chore. If they refuse to do the chore, bribe them with an allowance. If they still don't want to do anything and they make a mess, you can start to punish them with time outs if they don't keep the house clean. If that doesn't work, then I don't know what else to tell you.

Answer 11

Duct tape your kids to the couch and don't let them mess up the house in the first place!!!

LOL

In reality, just teach your kids to pick up after themselves. Also, make it a family project to clean on the weekends (dust, vaccuum, etc.). Reward them with going to the park or make them a special treat (ice cream) when they help.

Good luck raising your kids. I grew up in a single mom house (kinda messy), and I turned out OK!!!