Anyone have schedules for chores and homework that actually work? I need to get both my kids on one again but they seem not to work .. maybe I have to many things down or maybe Im just doing it wrong .

Hi Steph:

I also have 3kids, 12,9&3.5--and I work fulltime outside the home, I have been told I am tooo scheduled, but I do allow for exceptions and it works for us so.... Anyway here is goes.. When my older two get home from school-they have about 30minutes to eat snack and do nothing!! When I get home about 4pm we all...work 1/2hr doing chores, then they are required to do homework--not so much study for upcoming tests but work papers--usually it takes them no more than 1/2hr also. Then they are able to play, watch TV or do whatever till dinner--we eat then they can do whatever again till about 7-7:30pm that is when we get snacks going, and any studying for spelling tests or just read books and then it is baths and off to bed by 8:30is 9pm.... All my kids know this is the routine and have really never fought it,,,they like the fact of "me helping!!! in the work" and I like the fact it is 1 1/2hr cleaning in 1/2hr time :) also they know that when mommie gets house work done - I have more time to go to the park, play with them, help them... It just really works.

Hope this helps.
Michelle

Steph have I sent you my chart's for chores, homework and t.v. time? I have ton's and ton's of chart's some worked and some didn't but they work for other's so I just keep them all. If you would like let me know and I'll just email them to you. Or I can add them to your thread here.

Hugs,
Cherity

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Cheers! Ian

my kids are 9 and 10 /12, they take turns with the kitchen and bathroom chores...... rotating weekly. one week of 'hard labor' and one of 'easy' time :p they aren't thrilled with it, but it seems to be working well.

Steph,

Wrong? Mother's don't have that luxury last I checked. I thank my lucky stars on a daily basis that my wife choses to be a stay at home Mom. Don't get me wrong, I love my kids and I would certainly be the stay at home parent if she wanted to work (lord knows with her education, she could make a lot more money than I do!). Thing is, I have tried it. When I was on shore duty in South Carolina, working two jobs, eighty hour weeks and some change she asked me if I could get some time off so she could go to a symposium thingy for the week. I got the time off, and thought I'd have myself a little well earned break. HA! HA HA! I barely slept the whole time she was gone!). Now I admittedly don't have it down to the science she does, but I am also not the typically domestically illiterate hubby either. I can cook, I am no stranger to cleaning houses, and I manage okay with the kids. They do remind me regularly however that I AM NOT MOMMY, and "That's not how Mommy makes it". My point is, that while she has streamlined it to the point that she can do it and sleep and eat and take care of herself. She is still working much harder than I am at work.

So, you aren't wrong. Your instincts are dead on. Mother's really are designed for this sort of thing though. What you might try though, is pretty much exactly what you are doing. Looking into how other mothers are structuring those chores. Talk to your childrens doctors about the chores too.

Having been an ADD child myself, I can tell you that it was absolute hell to focus on doing one thing for any length of time. structure is key, but part of the idea is to teach them adaptive strategies for dealing with the things they can't effectively focus on that don't involve falling into the "Try harder" trap. Trying harder to focus on things they are simply not interested in, is not only physiscally painful for ADDers, it makes their performance worse. It actually causes shutdown of the executive centers altogether so they go from reduced function to no function. Schools and teachers commonly drive kids with ADD into this corner, over and over again, which is terrible for one's self esteem. The trick they have to learn is to push themselves until they just can't anymore and then switch to another task. They can track where they are at with a chart. This way progress is made on each task without forcing shutdown or pushing them to try to concentrate to the point of physical pain. Over time it can also help improve their concentration threshold, and if they are medicated help them break habbits formed when they could NOT do something.

You have very much the right idea Steph. Wow, I read the posts all of you parents of ADD kids put up and I wish my parents had been this way for me. You all sound so frustrated at times and worried you are bad parents or something, but you are trying so hard. My parents put me on pills for a year and then decided there was no such thing as ADD. After that no more pills, and my symptoms were simply due to character flaws. For these I was punished. When punishment did not work, this was simply due to the fact I was stubborn and would cut my own nose off to spite my face, so punishment was ramped up. By the time I was a teenager... Well, let's just say, I didn't speak to my father for the last several years before he died about anything more substantial than shop talk. So, all of you need to give yourselves a pat on the back for being there for your kids.

Oh wow im sorry to hear about that e-boy but maybe if your parents had the internet they might have thought differntly also with all information out there about add.


My husband got a taste of being a mom this past summer. Before last summer I used to call him because how much the kids were stressing me out and he would always say .. WHY DO YOU LET THEM GET TO YOU SO MUCH ? hahahah .. well this summer he had to take care of the kids while I was pregnant ( bad pregnancy extreamly sick) and laying in the bed or head in the potty. Anyway every day he would come up to me saying Help Im going out of my mind . I want to beat'em lol ...He never did but its nice to know that he finally knows how it feels . He hasnt said a word about it again.

Ive realized to give him a taste of his own medicine when he says something smart

Ok my daughter is 7 years old and she would never clean her room without me there holding her hand. This was pre Add Dianose. Now I tell her to clean her room in stages: pick up your barbies then come see me, now clean up you book etc etc etc... Well as tedious as this sounds it works!!!! Now I only have 2 children 7 and 2 1/2 and I have a little more time then you do with the baby and all your nerves must be shot. But if you break it down it really does work.
hope this helps
Robin

We use a schedule similar to badkat's. After school the kids get a snack and mental break while I check through the backpacks. The babies go down for a rest. At 4 pm homework time begins. Each in a quiet place.

I do not sit with each a kid and hold their hand during homework. It is way too reinforcing and I can become very frustrated very quickly. They have to save questions for when I come to check on them as I make the rounds. Questions have to be specific; no "I don't get it!" Instead, "What are personal pronouns?" would be an acceptable question. If they still don't understand a question or group of questions, the they make themselves a note in the margin about what they want to ask the teacher and I initial it. Ideally, they will have made some attempt at an answer, wrong or not. We don't tend to get hung up on things being 100% complete or correct. HW usually takes somewhere around an hour, give or take.

They have free time until dinner, which is at about 6 or six thirty. Each one of the big kids has an after dinner chore and they rotate at the first of the month. That never takes more than half an hour. They fix their lunches and lay out their clothes for the next day. Girls take night showers or baths and boys take morning. When all is done they have free time until their bedtime. If they are under the covers with everything done on time, they get 30 minutes extra to read in bed. Everybody wins with this little extra incentive.

As for the cleaning up of rooms, I find that letting the kids keep just a few toys in their rooms is essential. Too much is just too hard. They can choose what they want to keep and the rest goes in the attic. They can't get at the "deep storage" stuff except on designated day and time (Sat. am for us) when they are allowed to swap only. Less frustration for everybody, for sure. They make good choices and apprecaiate their belongings more.

An unexpected side benefit is that they have been working on some killer negotiating and sharing skills. "If you get out your bionicles this week, I'll get out my karaoke machine and we can trade."

I love your idea for switching out the toys, Flakey. I just pulled some lesser-used toys out of the toy room the other day, but forgot to put them downstairs. Oops. Of course, they have now been dumped back out of their boxes, and I'm back to square one.... ;) The kids are a lot more interested in their toys when they haven't seen them in a few days!

Ya I put some of my kids toys in bags and in the rv ... i try to rotate them .

flackey what do you do if they dont do there chores? I try to get my oldest to do the dishes and swtich the laundry and my middle child to take out the trash and fold the laundry .. then ill put them away ... Some nights though my oldest has 3 hours of homework to do . Which does make it hard. I have no clue why a 3rd grader would have that much homework .

My middle child got kicked off the bus for his behavior but if they ride the bus home they dont get home until 4 or 5 ... and they have to be up by 6am on bus days and 7am on when I drive them to school . ( im trying to get my youngest back on the bus I think its going to be a fight to ) * reason why he was kicked off is cus his adhd .. he was running in the isle and looking under and over his seat and then one day he started screaming.

Well, they just can't use their free time till it is done. That way there are no punishments for me too remember and enforce. Also I put it to them like this: "If you want to dilly-dally around, that is ok, because it is your free time you are wasting, not mine. " It also helps when one finishes quickly and gets to go play outside and the others are still dragging their behinds. That is way more incentive than I could ever impose artificially.

It sounds like your kids don't get much free time anyway with all the transportation. If they are resisting doing chores, it might be because they feel resentful about giving up what little free time they do have. (Three hours is mighty long to expect a third grader to sit and do homework after a day of school, I'd ask about it)

You probably don't want to hear this but you might want to just give them one job to do instead of two. If they have been complaining about doing chores, this could be your big chance to be viewed by them as being a very fair and reasonable parent. Just say, "kids, I have been thinking over what you said and you are right." Wouldn't you have loved to hear that from your parent as a kid?

If it were me, I'd make them keep the jobs I really didn't want to do myself. That'd be dishes and trash, but whatever. ;) When you have them do the laundry related chores, the folding person ends up waiting on the switching person----you basically gave them an excuse for putting it off. You could probably do it faster and better anyway.

They could be sick of having to do the same old chore every time. If that is the case, say "welcome to my world, kiddo!" Joking. Ask them how they feel about chores. That should give you a better idea of how to make it work at your house.

Also, don't forget to remind them of the following things: You do not ask them to do chores just so they can be your little slaves; helping run the household is part of being a family. Showing they can be responsible in the house is an excellent way to prove to you that they can be responsible out of the house. That last one will become more important as they get older.

Good luck.

Your one of those Mom critters ain'tcha flakey? ARRRRGH!

Just kidding! :-) As a father I stand thoroughly awed. My wife and most other mothers I have seen do so much, simultaneously! Have systems for everything, and plan on the fly. Planning is something I can do, but as a separate task or integrated into certain areas of life. Does that make any sense? My wife has a plan for everything. Even the dishes she buys. She buys a set she likes, of course, but they are also bought on the basis of how they match our other flat ware, and how they match our daughters as well because she ends up sending all this stuff to my daugher eventually anyway. Three tired planning with embedded aesthetics and she didn't even have to think about it. Amazing.

Mother's just do this stuff. I'm a guy and a father. I teach my kids how to talk smack when we pretend pro-wrestle. A useful skill to be sure, but hardly a talent. I kill spiders, and reach high stuff, a mantle of responsibility I am sure my boys will all one day shoulder as well (Shhh, I don't really kill the spiders if she's not looking. I capture them in a tissue and release them outdoors. They don't hurt anyone). I make a good "noise investigator" in the middle of the night. And I am the authority on "monsterology" in my household. So far having explained to my five year old that not a single one of the various species of fauna his brothers have described as living in his closet and under his bed, do not in fact exist, and that even if they did exist he has the meanest ugliest gorilla of an Idaho daddy in the world and they would be afraid to come near him, and Mommy is EVEN worse when it comes to her bambino's!

I don't drink out of the toilet or live in a little house out back, but in the household my role is closer to that of a labrador retriever than that of head of household. :-) Protector, playmate, and giver of lots of affection. Dopey eager to please willing to help in what limited fashion he may type. The wife runs the show at home because I am always out working. She is good at it though in ways I never could be. I am glad I am good enough at my jobs to manage, because I couldn't manage as a full time stay at home parent at the level she does.