12 Ways to Get Kids to Help Tidy the House

I Wish I’d Tried This Approach Years Ago

Toddlers love helping out with almost anything. Their desire to be big kids and copy everything they see means they love to pitch in around the house. But if, like me, you missed the opportunity to harness this helpfulness at that stage, and instead ended up with older kids who can’t be bothered to throw away their own trash, try this 12-12-12 Challenge to get kids on board with tidying the house.

I first read about this approach over at Apartment Therapy. Even though our home no longer qualifies as small, I still love reading their posts about small space living. This article details the 12-12-12 strategy for decluttering any area of your home. But guess what? It works wonders for kids as well as adults.

The premise is simple. Find twelve things that need to be put away, twelve things that are trash (or in our house, recycling), and twelve things that can be donated. Don’t get overwhelmed trying to tackle a big project, like an entire house or even one very messy room. Instead, start small with this very achievable goal. You can do it once a week or once a month or however often it works for your family. The sneaky part? Once you start small, you may be motivated to continue.

Make sure you have a box, bin, bag, or other designated receptacle for donated items. For the other 24 items, kids (and spouses!) will already know where to find the trash can or where the item belongs. We found it easier to work in one room than spend all our time moving one item from one part of the house to another individually. But the beauty of this strategy lies in the flexibility. It comes with a clear goal. Yet you can complete the task however it works best for you, and it can vary from family member to family member. Letting kids have some control over how they go about it gives them more input into the process. 

Kids can easily round up twelve things they no longer need. For my eleven year old daughter, it meant we went through her closet and dress-up bin to sort out the clothing that no longer fit. I’d been trying to complete that task with her for weeks, and we never found the time. But now that she was motivated, we had no trouble knocking it out. My eldest son had trouble finding things to throw away, so he put an extra 10 things back in their place as a substitute. And my youngest child sorted through one of his overflowing toy bins and had no trouble selecting more than twelve items he no longer loved.

Even my husband, who usually balks at any sort of cleaning, much less getting rid of things, managed to find 36 items to fulfill his portion of the bargain. And unlike our previous attempts, the kids spent zero time arguing over who had taken something out and who was responsible for putting it away. 

In the end, we eliminated way more than 180 items from our house without breaking a sweat. We used this strategy as a substitute for our monthly one hour cleaning session, which we call All Family Clean Up. And we got so much more done in a fraction of that time. 

This strategy may not work so well next time we use it once the novelty wears off. But even if the effectiveness fades over time, it’s simple, costs nothing, and it took the entire family less than half an hour to complete. So it will definitely stay in our repertoire, especially for a quick and dirty way to whip the house into shape.