Get Your Teen To Clean

Jen: I am so excited because we have Joy Williams. She is the creator of the Shine Guides, and she is here to talk to us today about how to get your teenager to do chores.  Joy, do you wanna introduce yourself and tell us a little bit about you?   Joy: Yeah, as you mentioned, my name is Joy and I am a mom of four kids.   My kids are now aged 17 to 11, so they are deeply entrenched in the teenage years and we live in Indiana. I am also the creator of a shop called the Shine Guides, and those are visual step by. Chore guides to help your kids during chore times. Your kids, your teens, your families, everyone get involved and be able to do the chores quickly and correctly.   Jen: That's so awesome. So we know as parents of teenagers, right, our teenagers do not always get excited about helping out around the house about doing chores. Why do you think that is?   Joy: Yeah. When kids are little, they are more excited to be part of the family unit and contribute because they find value in the family. That way they're excited to help. It feels like they're important, but as they grow up and they get busier, the shine kind of wears off of that. Older kids in general are busy. They have extracurriculars after school. Their school day is just much more intense, and a lot of times they wanna come home and blow off steam. And so the last thing they need to do is come home and feel overwhelmed. And a lot of times, chores are filled with overwhelm. They need clarity and expectation in order to help alleviate a lot of that feeling of overwhelm.   Jen: Yeah, totally. I think so often our kids, we forget that they have so much going on. Like we're like, we have so much going on. We know how much we've got going on, but we forget that they are also gone so much of the day.   They have friends, they have school commitments, they have sports and extracurriculars, they have family commitments, and that's a lot that weighs on their shoulders when they're not really great at handling all of that overwhelm, yet. They're still developing that skill.   Joy: Overwhelm is not fun for anyone, even adults. Overwhelm is an emotional response that we all have and you're feeling overloaded, overpowered, and a lot of times defeated just by the amount you have weighing on you.   Jen: Yeah, totally. So what do we do so that we don't end up adding to the overwhelm that our teens are already experiencing?   Joy: I think realizing that maybe your chore schedule has to be more flexible now that they're older. We got into a really great pattern of having Saturday morning to be our chore morning where everybody helps with the deep cleaning. And as the kids have gotten older and we've gotten into things like cheer competitions and robotic competitions, those Saturday mornings aren't free anymore.   So being willing to be a little flexible about the schedule and when the chores get done, and even having weeks where maybe the chores don't get done, and that's okay giving them a pass on that because they have so much else going on.   I think the second part is being really clear on expectations and also your own expectations.   As your kids are growing, sit down and evaluate with yourself. What do I expect from them now that their life is so much busier? What is realistic to expect from them when they come home from school?   Jen: Yeah. And one of the things you and I talked about a little earlier, before we started the podcast was knowing why you're doing this anyway.   Why are we doing chores in our family? Like, what is the purpose of that? Tell me a little bit more about that.   Joy: Yeah. I mean, for some families it's, they want their kids to learn how to do the chores. They want to send their kids out in the world fully prepared to do the chores.   For other families, it's, they need to contribute. They're part of the family. They need to be contributing in this way. Mom is not here to clean the house for everyone. Everyone needs to pitch in.   For other families, it's a way to earn money. It's a way for them to have a give and take and a way for them to be able to earn that money without it just being handed to them.   And for some families, it's a combination of all of those.   Jen: Yeah, and I think it's so important that when we talk about chores, we customize it to our family. It's really important that we think about what those goals are because when we know the goal, it's gonna be so much easier to get our kids on board than if they just feel like we're demanding all these things of them.   One of the things that we have found has helped so much in our family, is really giving our kids a say as they get older in the kinds of jobs they wanna do.  I have a daughter who is really, really fantastic at all the details. She does detail cleaning like nobody's business like sometimes I will just find her cleaning out the fridge for fun because she wants the fridge to be cleaner.   And I have another daughter who details are not her jam. Like they just are not her thing. And so when we talk about like, who's gonna have what chores, what kind of things do you wanna participate in? We get them involved so that we can find the jobs that really fit best for them, for their personalities and for what they like to do. And I think that makes it easier to not have that conflict all the time.   Joy: Mm-hmm, definitely. If they have a say in what they're doing, if they help create the plan, they're going to be so much more apt to actually follow through with that plan.   Jen: Yeah, absolutely. So what else can we do as parents to really, make it easy for our kids to get involved in these jobs without the conflict?   Joy: Well, one thing that I really focus on when I talk about chores and kids is clarity. You really need to be clear with your kids on what you expect from them in the chores. So not just about the surrounding idea of doing chores, but in the chores   I have gone and gotten my oil changed. Hundreds of times in my life, I have walked, I've pulled my car in and I've watched 'em change my oil.   But if somebody came up to me and said, okay, joy, it's time for you to change your oil. Can you do it? I'd say, oh yeah, I could probably do that. But if they just handed me the oil and walked away, no, there's no way I could do it. Yes, I've seen it done a bunch of times, but no, unless you are clear on how I do it, unless you give me some steps and show me how.   There's no way I'm going to be able to do that correctly. And so then of course you're just gonna shut down and have a horrible attitude about it. And that's the same can be said about kids and chores.   If you just walk up and say, okay, go clean the toilet, well, you might expect that by now. As teenagers, they know exactly what you mean by that, but a lot of times they don't. And even if you've shown them in the past, they might still need another run through and they might need that run through several times before they're able to go and just do it by themselves.   Jen: Yeah, I mean, I think even as we get married and we're making a home with our spouse, we both have different expectations of how things should be done, and so it's totally normal that our kids wouldn't understand our exact expectations for how the chores should be done.    It's gonna take them some time to learn those details about what we expect. I love that.   So will you summarize the tips that you have for how to help our kids do chores without the fights?   Joy: Yes. Managing the expectations, whether they be your own expectation, your kids’ expectations or both.   Make sure you know what your values are, what you want your kids to get out of these before you set up the expectation for them of what they need to do.   Also involving the kids in which chores, what plays to their strengths.   Make sure that you are clear about what you want them to do to help prevent the overwhelm.   And also remember to be flexible and treat them how you would wanna be treated. If they have a really busy day, maybe the chores don't get done that day. And that is okay.   Jen: I love that. Thank you so much. If my listeners want to connect with you, where can they find you? Where can they find your shine guides? Give us all the deets.   Joy: Sure. I am @shine.with.joy on Instagram. That's me. And then the Shine Guides are @theshineguides on Instagram and you can find the link to purchase them either place. ( https://www.etsy.com/shop/TheShineGuides)