What's that thing on the fridge???

Yup. We now have a new and improved version of my previous chore charts on our fridge! This is Day 1. Here is how my program works....

Kyleigh and Reece each have their own chart with tasks that I think are age appropriate for them to accomplish. I included some chores (getting all school materials together) as well as behavioral items (no talking back), but it's mostly stuff they should be doing everyday anyway (putting things away, brushing teeth, etc.). There are 16 lines of activities or behaviors on each and they are expected to accomplish at least 12 or they don't get TV or computer time the next day. I put stars beside two behaviors that will automatically result in loss of electronics which are "Losing your temper" to include any yelling or fighting between the two and "Talking Back", which I pretty much have no tolerance for.

We were completely up front with them and they both looked over these and agreed with them and liked them (we'll see how that goes once they have a bad day!!) Other than Kyleigh looking at me like I was completely crazy for threatening to take her computer away if she didn't her 12 stickers a day, I think it went well and they both understand clearly what it expected of them. Along with their daily activities, we also added just one special "helper" chore a week. I put several slips of paper listing out activities around the house and the girls will randomly pick one a week to be there responsibility.

This week, Kyleigh is the bathroom cleaner (helps me clean the bathrooms on Fridays) and Reece is the Dishwasher helper (dries the dishes and I put them up, rinses them off for me to load the dishwasher). I sat down and explained what each of them meant in detail so they couldn't claim later they didn't know what to do :-)

What do you get for all of this hard work helping out around the house and being good you ask?

Money, but our allowance is a little different. If the girls get at least 12 stickers everyday that week, they will each earn $2 a week for themselves to do whatever they want with. They also will earn an additional $2 each "giving" money where they will get to decide if they want to donate to a cause, buy someone a gift, etc. They can only use this money for others. There is no telling what they will pick to do with it, but I think that is the fun part.

We hope we are opening the door for a lot of things with this....hoping they will learn to help out more, have good behavior, earn money, save money and also be giving to others. They were both very excited to start this morning and already very competitive! Imagine that!