Tell Your Child To Clean Their Room And Have Them Really Do It

Getting your kids to clean their rooms is difficult.  It is one of the things parents fight over most with their kids.  It is understandable that we want their rooms to be clean.  Their rooms are part of our home and when they look like a pigsty, we feel that it prevents our home from being completely clean.  In addition, we realize that they would enjoy their things much more if they took time to clean their rooms.  Things would be more organized and enjoyable.

Let’s think about why they won’t clean their rooms when we tell them to.  Part of this might be laziness and disobedience but a bigger part of it is usually that they are overwhelmed when they try to clean their rooms.  And let’s be honest here.  When we go in to clean their rooms for them or help them on occasion, we feel overwhelmed too, don’t we?  When they feel overwhelmed they don’t want to do any of it because the task seems so large.  Also, oftentimes, they don’t know where to begin when we tell them to clean their rooms.

It works better when you tell them specific things to do in their rooms rather than just telling them to clean their rooms which is a general instruction that doesn’t explain what you specifically want done.  Tell them to do tasks such as to pick up their clothes, make their bed, dust their furniture or pick up their blocks.  This is a more involved process for you but is guaranteed to give you better results than giving them a general instruction.

It also helps if you have them do a little bit each day rather than trying to have it all done in one day.  This keeps the task more doable and less trouble for the both of you.  Encouraging them to keep their room clean can help prevent it from getting into such a mess.  Rewarding them for so many days kept clean is a good idea to use.