Updated Chore Charts

For quite a while, we used a button chore chart for each of the kids, and it worked. As the kids got older, though, they sort of outgrew the old system. My response, until now, has been to just not have any kind of chart in place. I thought it would work. But really, more than anything, it was me dropping the ball. Weeks would pass, and it would totally slip my mind to give them their rewards. We were doing allowance $ for a week of chores. Inconsistency quickly became our biggest issue... the kids were inconsistent in what they were doing... I was inconsistent in how I was rewarding... and soon it just became either (a) I paid them all whether they earned it or not, or (b) I just forgot to pay them altogether. Neither is good. Time for a new plan.

Nothing a quick stop at Target can't fix. I got a few supplies: a black dry-erase board, some wet erase markers, Mon-Sun magnets (all found in the office supplies section), and a packet of Smash journal strips (found in the scrapbooking section).

And I put together a chore chart for the week... 

It's pretty basic... Days of the week across the top, chores down the side. If your initial shows up in the box, it's your chore for the day.

As for rewards... it goes like this:

• For each day that you get ALL of your chores done, you get a dot. The dots will be tracked at the bottom of the board, under their names.
• Once you  have 7 dots, you get whatever the individual reward is for that week (I'll get to that in a second). Dots carry over from one week to the next until you get to seven... it could take you one week or three weeks to earn 7 dots. At the time you DO get 7 dots, whatever the individual reward is for that week is what you earn. 
• There are 2 sets of rewards... Individual Reward and All Together Reward. The Individual Reward is earned by accumulating 7 dots. The All Together Reward is earned if, and only if, all three of them get all of their dots for the given week. So, EVERYONE does EVERYTHING Monday - Sunday of the current week. If that happens, they get a collective reward as well as the individual reward. It's my hope that this will encourage them to support and encourage each other. We'll see how it goes. 
• Each week, we randomly pull out one Individual and one All Together Reward Card. That's what you  see in the top left corner. It changes each week. 

Our rewards include things like $5 cash, a $5 gift card to Barnes & Noble, 2 1/2 hours of electronic time, and having a friend over (maybe for a sleep-over or something more special than just the random friend who shows up to play for a bit).  All Together rewards include things like Cupcakes from the specialty cupcake bakery in town, a trip to Dairy Queen, a day at the zoo or museum, put put, popcorn party & movie night... stuff like that. 

It's new. It's untested. But the kids helped develop it, and they are excited about it. I think the degree of its success will actually depend on me. I need to follow through in a timely manner with the rewards. Otherwise, their motivation will drop off pretty quickly, and we'll be back to where we've been for the past several months.