picking up his room

[Angie L]

I am having a terrible time getting my son to clean his room. I have tried taking things away and many other things but he is awful about picking up his things unless I help. Anyone have any suggestions that have worked for them.

[MK]

Don't ask me, I have the same problem. Only I've got two sharing the same very small room. I have lots of shelves, I have cleaned their room, with "a place for everything,and everything in it's place", and shown them how I want it, I have gotten in there and helped them, but they just don't do it unless dh or I actually sit in there and tell them what to do. They are 7 and 5, I would think that after all the help and instruction they've received they could do it on their own together. Am I expecting too much?

[Diane]

IMHO they are not picking up the mess because they know that if they leave it long enough... you'll eventually come in and help them with the clean up. This is what my dd always did... She KNOWS me SO well and knew that I could only stand looking at it for so long... and then I'd clean it. LOL I really had to force myself not to do it. Now that she's older we have a rule... she can't go anywhere or have anybody over unless her room is clean. It's amazing how clean she can keep that room now. Good luck... :)

[Amy2]

Well, I don't know how young your son is, and maybe it's too late for this kind of thing (my son is five) but we do a lot of "races." Can you get the toys picked up before I count to forty. Can you clean your room before I finish making my bed. (We make our beds at the same time, and I call out "Are you done?" and he says "No, are you?" "No, are you?" until we're done.) That kind of thing. When it feels like a game sometimes that motivates him.
Another other thing I read, which really helped me is NOT to nag him. I say "I see that your toys are on the floor" and that's it. Usually he will simply pick them up. If not, I just wait and when he asks for a treat, or for me to play baseball with him, or to watch a movie I will say "Sure! As soon as your room is done." And just leave it at that.
Sometimes I think they want us to help them because they want us to be with them, not that they really need our help. If you stop helping, and really stick to it, he will figure out that he has to do it himself, and usually if he does it sooner, he will have more time to do the fun stuff he wants to do. Like hang out with you!
Amy

[PamE]

My dd just recently started getting really good at cleaning up her room. I think the big mess got so overwhelming that she didn't even know where to start! Somethiing I've started in the past month is having her "clean" her room twice a day, once in the morning, and once in the afternoon. (We homeschool so she's around more to mess it up, lol!) That brought lots of groans until I pointed out that doing it that way never took more than five or ten minutes at a time because it didn't have a chance to get really messy.

Anyway, just a thought.

[KarlaB]

I have tried the same things that Amy mentioned and have had good luck. I don't know if it's due to age though. My dks are just shy of 2 & 4, so making things a game or race still works with them. I have also read success stories about just making it a statement ("I see that your toys are on the floor") or saying, "Sure you can have a cookie...as soon as the toys are picked up" and not nagging. Good Luck! :)

[RCT]

the clean up game too, I start in our room, while they start in thier rooms, of course we end up taking half of his toys out of her room and vise versa...LOL....I try to make it fun, mine are also young, 3 and 5, the five year old is starting to think of this as work, asked me if it was a chore? guess I need to start thinking about allowance......

We have a rule that if it isn't picked up and put away by bedtime, it goes away for one week, this is good with toys they really love, but I have some toys I am constantly picking up and storing for a week, last time I threw one out.....

[Angie L]

Thank you all for your ideas. I'll have to try making it more like a game and maybe he will be more excited about cleaning. My son is also just 5. We have tried the allowance and sometimes it works other times it doesn't.