I hate cleaning up.
However, I do believe cleaning up is a valuable skill for kids to learn—not to perfect, but just participate in … at least a little bit.
How do you get kids to clean up? Normal people would offer ice cream or time outs. But if you don’t want to use threats or bribes then what tools do you have?
One of your biggest parenting tools is your silliness.
I do a couple of silly, dumb things that actually work. Plus I give them a lot of empathy too. (That’s another tool you’ve got!)
Watch here to see how I get two brothers to clean up.
To your playfulness,
Cecilia and Jason
So awesome watching you problem-solve in action. Sometimes a clean-up song helps us (but it doesn’t work every time!) Thank you for posting this.
Thanks, Marisa! Cleanup Freeze Dance is a favorite of ours. We have also used pickup by color and, as they got older, index cards of cleanup jobs randomly chosen (and sometimes traded).