Help with Reward Program

I have a 5 year old son and he has a chore chart and if he completes all his chores at the end of the week he gets an allowance.(You can substitute with a special outing or whatever you see fit) You can go online to www.dltk-cards.com/chart and they have custom chore charts (free) The charts are awesome and we let my son put his own stars in the chart boxes when he completes a chore (he has such a proud look on his face when he puts up his star) Hope this helps!

During his cleaning his room, what really helps me son is if I give him small tasks at a time until it's done. Like I will say okay pick up all your clothes and tell me when your done. Then I will say pick up all your cars and put them in a the toy box. Then I will say Good job and encourage him along the way, but he is still doing all the work.

Another thing that helps is organizing everything to a specific spot. If it is cars I will get a container and put car stickers on it or lego container.
I have learned sometimes room cleaning is overwhelming to a child.

Then you can pick a reward. At our house it is allowence at the end of the week. If the room isn't clean they don't get their allowence. Something that really works for me is a sticker chart. Everytime he cleans his room maybe even without complaining he gets a sticker and the stickers can add up to something.

Let me know how it works.

My daughters room was always trashed, barbies and all their misc stuff laying everywhere, dress up clothes and jewls all over the place. I got so sick of hounding her to clean it up and i got so sick of having to go in and help all the time I finally made her keep her bedroom door closed. I let it go....until the day she steped on her barbie kitchen and it hurt her foot. Now i felt bad for the pain and the blood as i was cleaning up her foot i explained to her if she kept it picked up this never would have happened and mommy has to clean the whole rest of the house top to bottom so mommy shouldnt have to clean up after her 7 year old....needless to say you can eat off her floor now. I let her use the hand vac, dusters and anything else she feels she needs to clean her room and sometimes i wish she would do the rest of the house LOL.
Bottom line...no new toys until he does start picking up his room, dont add anymore mess, taking things away dont help cuz hey you just picked up his room again for him. Let it pile up, let him step on and break his toys just make him keep his door shut. Sooner or later he will get sick of the mess and how he cant find the lazer for his transformer and will start to pick it up himself.

I have a 7 year old son, 7 year old daughter and 5 year old daughter and less than a year ago we had this very problem. I bought a bunch of totes took out all of the toys and limited the toys in their room to a few favorite toys (like legos) and some books and a couple of stuffed animals or dolls). Everything else I placed in totes and labeled and put them in the basement. Now the rule is each child can get out a tote but must put it away to get out another one. The effect was that rule has also changed how they see their room. They now can clean up their room (in minutes)without any difficulties because they only have a few things to take care of and it is not overwhelming to them. Everything in their rooms "lives" somewhere. If they want something in their room they have find a perminate place for it to live.

I hope that helps. It was because of my frustration that I took out all of the toys in their room but it has blessed our family and created peace in our home.

My daughter is a major packrat! So I know exactly what you are going through. The system I found that worked the best with my daughter was to do a spring clean of all my own stuff and arrange a rummage sale. I asked if she wanted to earn some extra money for all her old toys, clothes, books etc and she jumped at the chance, we removed about 3 garbage bags of clothes, 2 boxes of books and about 3 boxes of toys that hadn't been used in years. I explained that she had to help label and sell everything at the rummage sale and whatever cash she made off her stuff was hers to keep! She ended up making about $45. and was ecstatic! Everything that didn't sell went to Salvation Army which I explained was going to help people who needed it and we now have a spotless, easy to walk through and keep clean 8 year old girls bedroom! She also got to choose new paint and a new rug.

I guess i look at "chores" as things that aren't necessarily supposed to be fun. you do them or you lose them. If he won't pick it up, take a big bag or box and scoop it all up and lock it maybe in the trunk or somewhere he can't get it. he can earn it back a piece at at time. If you have to do it a couple of times and he gets to where he has no clothes, (it's summer so if he walks around the house for a day in his underwear will that hurt). Or if he gets down to one pair, have him wash it by hand in the sink so he can wear it again. pretty soon he'll figure out that if he just does it as he goes it's so much easier.

What moivates him? what does he really like, really dislike?
You could use his hearts desire as a token and whis dislike as disiplin.
for example:
my 7 year child loves to play dress up/go to the public library and visit his cousin.
I use these as rewards after he earns so many tokens. He earns tokens by cleaning up after himself without having to be told more than 2 times.
My child hates "the count down" where I count down from 20 and if he has not done what I asked he to do after two times asking, he gets a privlage taken away, usually a favorite costume will get put up for a whole day, anything longer than that is not effective as per the attention span issue with him.

We have a "star chart" where my son, who is 6, gets stars. If he gets 5 stars before afternoon quiet time, he gets to play his xbox or watch tv during quiet time. If he doesn't have 5 stars before it is quiet time he has to take a nap. I don't have to remind him to do anything anymore. (He gets stars for brushing his teeth, making his bed, cleaning up his room, putting his breakfast dishes in the dishwasher and then I have a blank that says "doing something nice for someone".

Not all tasks require a reward--real life simply doesn't work that way. There are some things that we need to learn to do simply because they need to be done. I have always had two seperate "chores lists" for my four kids, one that gets done because it has to be done (cleaning their room, helping with dinner, dishes, etc.) and the other for earning an allowance (mowing the lawn, weeding the garden, etc.). Children need to understand that there are certain things in life you have to do and no reward should be expected--when was the last time you got a reward for cleaning YOUR room???