Jobs, jobs, jobs

Recently some friends asked to see some of my job lists. I had posted a photo of my funny son's comment which he wrote on his job list for the week. I had unintentionally left a blank spot and he filled it in with his awesomeness.

Anyways, I absolutely LOVE a good job chart. Detailed job charts make me happy, because once it's written out and assigned, then I can forget about it. Of course, a good job chart is all in the details. How detailed you make it depends on the kids being assigned the job. The other thing I love about detailed lists, is that I don't usually enter the assigned cleaning area and have to say "You call this job done?" Because, as long as every thing is checked, then their job is done.

So, I have so many different lists. Here are a few (and really, this is only a fraction of the lists on my computer).

Here's a sample weekend list:

Daily plus Saturday List
Another Random Chore List

Here's one that includes the little kids. You might notice that the little ones' jobs are written in German, but the big kids' jobs are in English (that's just how things roll in our home). I usually cut the list up and give each kid his own portion.

Another job list

Some mornings, I'm feeling overwhelmed with everything I need to get done. So I just start writing everything down at the top of a page. Then I take some of those things and start divvying out chores to the kids. Once I do that, then I start feeling less overwhelmed. Often, I'll let the kids pick which ones they want.
Fill in the Blank

I did want to mention how I often divide chores. Actually "doing" your chores is not an option, but you do have an option as to which chores you do. So, I often whistle and announce quite loudly (so that everyone can hear) that I'm about to hand out chores. The first person to arrive gets to pick first. This ensures that the kids usually hurry as fast as they can so that they can get the first pick.

Here are my some of my favorite lists. These are the Company Clean lists. I pull them out when we're expecting company. We were expecting company this past Sunday, so on the previous Sunday (during our family council meeting), I printed out the lists and let the kids choose which ones they wanted to do. I LOVE these, because they have actual check boxes in front of each item (I don't think the check boxes show up in the Google Docs). They're also fairly detailed. I hang them up in the assigned area, where I can see them. I usually give them a few days to complete them (this is usually in addition to their daily kitchen jobs...I'll do another post on Kitchen Jobs...because that's a whole other topic). Anyways, I like to see them making progress. I remind them during the week to check off a few things each day. As I walk through the house, I can see who has been checking off their boxes.

Company Clean Family Room
Company Clean Kitchen
Company Clean Living and Dining
Company Clean Laundry and Mudroom
Company Clean Outside Jobs
Company Clean Upstairs and Kids' Bath

Sometimes, instead of lists, we call them tickets. We used to do "job tickets" all the time. The deal was that we had some reward at the end of the day and that in order to take part in that reward, you had to turn in your job ticket. I don't have very many of these on the computer, since I usually just wrote them on 3x5 cards. But here's one example that I found:
Job Tickets

I also had another kind of ticket. These were "pay jobs" that the kids bid on at the beginning of the summer. I would give it to the kid who bid for the least amount of money and who promised to do it by a certain date. Here's a list of our job auction items from a few years back:

Pay Jobs

Family Council and why we LOVE it!!

We started doing family council when our oldest kids entered the preteen years. We've always had Family Home Evening on Monday nights (What is Family Home Evening). But as our kids got older, we found that the "family business" was taking over our family home evenings. So, we started doing family council on Sunday nights.

Family council is the time when we conduct all the family business. We also set and review family goals. It really keeps us on track. Running a family is like running a business or  organization. If you want it to be successful and effective, you need to have a purpose and goals. Our primary and over-arching goal is to return to live with our Heavenly Father, which means that we want to live our lives in a way that is pleasing to Him. And we know that living in such a way will result in our own greatest happiness. To some, that might sound like a strange or quirky goal. But this goal truly directs all of our decisions as a family. We want to be together forever, because we REALLY like each other.

Over the years, our family council agenda has morphed to fit the needs of our family. Since we speak both German and English at home, the agenda started out in German. I really pushed the German for a long time, but after a while, it just got too difficult to communicate effectively. It just got too hard to discuss the business of our English speaking environment in German. So, eventually, we switched to English. But as you can see on the later agendas, "Speaking German" is always listed as one of our goals. Here's an example of one of our earlier agendas:
German Family Council Agenda

Here are some of the English family council agendas we've used over the years:
English Family Council Agenda (early years).
English Family Council Agenda (middle years)
English Family Council Agenda (another version)
Family Council Agenda filled out with service hours

Nowadays, I bring up the file on the TV screen (instead of printing it and writing on it). I actually fill it out on the computer as we talk. Sometimes, I bring it up on the laptop and then link the screen to the TV so that everyone can see what I'm typing. When we're done, I just "Save As". It's so nice to have a whole history of family council agendas saved on the computer. It's fun to look back on past years and see a snapshot of a given week.

After we're done with family council, I often print out page 2 of the agenda (the page with the goals) and post it where we all can read it throughout the week.

Most Current Family Council Agenda

As you can see from the agenda above, we finally began including the younger kids in our family council meetings. They love to participate and with the older kids at college, it's nice to have a bigger group contributing. When the little ones are participating, we do most of our speaking in German, even though the agenda is in English. If you look at the "goals" section of the above agenda, you'll see that the big kids have English goals and the little kids say their goals in German.

Many years back, we came up with a family motto and added it to our agenda. At the beginning of each family council, one of the kids reads the motto. Some of us have it memorized because we hear it so often. I love hearing the kids read our family motto:

We will have a home filled with laughter, joy, kindness and fun. We will treat each other with respect and love. We will support each other in all that we do. Our entertainment choices, our language, our appearance and our activities will invite the Spirit of the Lord into our family.  Each of us will strive to have a strong, personal relationship with our Heavenly Father. We will put others’ needs ahead of our own. Our focus will be to lift, comfort and bless those around us.  We will create fun and lasting family memories and avoid anything that would cause lasting regret. 

By the way, I would LOVE, LOVE, LOVE it, if a native German speaker could translate our motto for us. With our younger ones starting to participate, I would love to be able to read the motto in German. I could do it, of course, but I don't think I could do a perfect job.

I also added a "service hours" section a few years back. This has been super helpful. Each week the kids report if they've done any service hours and I log them. It's been so nice to have that info at my fingertips as the kids have filled out scholarships and applied for NHS, etc.

Having family council has blessed our family so much. It has brought us closer together. It has helped us to support each other in our goals. It has helped us to just work out all the logistics of running a family (like who is driving which car to which activity and when). It's helped us to divide the work around the house. It has helped us to celebrate our uniqueness. But mostly, it has helped us to all be on the same page as we work towards the same long-term goal.


I love these articles on the importance of holding family council:
Family Councils---A Conversation
Working Together in Family Councils

My Favorite Job Chart of All-time

So, I'm going to introduce the job chart that has been used in our family for well over 15 years. I love it because it's so versatile and it helps me keep track of what has been done. I can glance at it and know which children have done their jobs. It also has each job detailed so that the kids don't have to argue with me about whether or not a job is actually done. This is actually a photo of when we were using it about 10 years ago. It has since morphed to accommodate older kids and a new batch of younger kids. I've actually replaced the three college age kids' names with the younger kids names. Throughout the years, I've changed what is in the columns. Some summers, I would have one "kitchen chore" column, a "inside job" column and an "outside job" column. One of my favorite things about this job chart is that it's so changeable. I can easily add new jobs. In fact, over the years I have a HUGE pile of job tags that I can add. Often I get up in the morning, look around the house, see what jobs really needs to get done and hang the corresponding tags on the chart. Then the kids get up and look at the chart and groan...but, hey, that's life. I also sort through my "pay jobs" (purple cards) an only hang the ones that really need to get done. Oh, and of course, the biggest change is that, over the years, I've had to substantially increase my pay for the older kids. By then, though, we often came up with job contracts at the beginning of the summer and the kids bid on the contracts (an idea I got from reading "Cheaper By the Dozen"). Maybe, I'll do another post on job lists and contracts when I get around to it.

A description of how we used the chart back in 2002 (it has changed a little throughout the years): The first column with the heart keeps track of whose "Special Night" it is. That's when each child gets to stay up late and do something with mom and dad. The five columns after the names are all the jobs they have every day: (1) Morning jobs (prayer, make bed, teeth, get dressed), (2) Practice (piano & German homework), (3) Daily Chore (clean family room, living room, kitchen etc.), (4) Value (did they do something in that month's value-"dependablity" or "honesty"? We try to focus on a different value each month--this month we're working on being more dependable.), (5) Evening jobs (clean room, get ready for bed, brush teeth). As they complete each task, they get to turn the tab over to the "Happy Face" side. If all their tabs are turned over before 7:30 without too many reminders, they get to add 25 cents to the "money column" (that's an incentive to get them to do everything on their own). Otherwise, they don't get paid for doing these "required" daily tasks. If they want to earn extra money, then they can look on the "To Do" chart below. When they complete an "money" job, they move it over to the "Done" side and add the appropriate "money" to their hook. The column on the far right is Saturday jobs. No one gets paid for Saturday jobs. They just have to be done. On the bottom, I store extra "chores" and "values" so that I can hang them up as needed. In the bottom righthand corner (yellow cards) are all the chore descriptions. So, when I say "clean the bathroom", they can read on the card exactly what I mean by that. We've been giving the kids a base allowance each week. (Ben gets $1 and the girls get 50 cents--they'll get $1 when they turn 8). They don't have to do anything to get the base amount.  For example, each week Ben hangs up his '$1 tab' and then on the days he earns extra money, he hangs up the appropriate tabs on his "money column". Then, usually on Fast Sundays, during Family Council, we pay them the money. All they need to do is go up and get their money tabs and cash them in. We then sit down and take out tithing and a little chunk for savings. They get to put the rest in their piggy banks.

So, below is the latest version of our job chart. Lately, I haven't been using the pay tags as much...but you can see that there has been considerable inflation on the pay tags. I added another column of daily chores. I also covered up my college kids' names and replaced them with our little kids' names. Over the years we have had all sorts of different scenarios on this chart. Sometimes, we track our weekly goals that we have set during our monthly family council. Sometimes, we use it for Saturday chores.

Motivation is Key!!

Sometimes, I require that all tags be turned over (except the bed time chores) in order for them to receive a special privilege--like screen time or being able to play with a friend. Sometimes, I give out give out treats or special privileges (like less jobs the following day) to any child who successfully completed all of their chores for the day. Or, sometimes, we'll make a big family dessert and those kids who finished their chores get seconds. You cold also use one of the columns to track points which go towards an end-of-summer prize. Each time a kid completes all all the chores in a given day, they get to add a point tag to the point column. There are SO many possibilities!! Like all job charts, this chart works as well as the parent who implements it. No job charts work on their own. They all require the parent to motivate and follow up and reward!! So, good luck!!