Life Coach: Treat Assigning Kids' Chores Like A CEO
CHICAGO (CBS) -- Who doesn't want to come home to a nice clean house? But if you have kids, getting them to pitch in can be tough.
Help is on the way.
CBS 2's Roseanne Tellez takes a look at strategies that won't make you feel like a nag.
Four kids, two working parents, and a dog; the Haney family's stuff has a way of piling up. How bad can it get?
"Really messy. Like, the hall was really messy, all the clothes outside people's doors," 9-year-old Finn Haney said. "I was okay with it."
Finn will do anything to get out of housework.
His sister, 11-year-old Aliza Haney said, "When we were trying to do laundry, he was hiding behind the couch in the playroom."
But mom Patti Haney isn't laughing. She said, when she walks in and sees that, "it feels really … it makes me feel really disrespected."
When asked if she and her siblings have assigned chores to do every day, Emma Haney, 17, said "Theoretically, but it doesn't usually happen that way."
Getting kids to do their share of housework can be work.
Rayanne Coy is a life coach at the Samaritan Counseling Center in Barrington and a mother of four.
She had little trouble getting her kids to come to the kitchen the other day to do the dishes. But she said "it hasn't been easy."
Not until she learned what she calls "parenting with peace and purpose. "
Coy's first piece of advice: "One of the things is we've just made it part of our routine. It's expected."
Rattling off too many chores can be overwhelming. Coy said parents should keep it short and simple, with a 10-minute tidy.
"I'll go over to our mud room and say 'clean up on aisle 3,'" she said.
Another tip from Coy: if your kids are small, you can make it a game. But teenagers, like her oldest son are another story.
"This is one of my pet peeves. Wet towels on the floor," Coy said.
But in his room, Kevin Coy gets a pass. It's a trade-off for helping with the rest of the house.
Coy also explained that older kids often respond well to cash.
"I have a daughter who likes to earn money. And they want to buy the jewelry," Coy said. "I think it's just knowing who your child is, knowing what motivates them."
Over at the Haney house, there's a flip side to rewards.
"There are consequences. You know, they have to do the chores before they can do some preferred activity, or we just have an electronics moratorium," dad James Haney said.
Another tip that's working well for the Haneys is to write down the assigned chores.
"It kind of gives me a sense of accomplishment that, hey, even though I didn't' want to do it, I got it done and now I kind of feel the high of actually doing something that's worth doing" said 15-year-old Noah Haney.
Rayanne Coy has one more piece of advice. She said you should run your family like a CEO runs a business. Negotiate agreements with your children to get things done. That way they feel like they're in charge.
