Project Time

 This post is part of my thoughts on how to teach the kids to work.

"The problem is not so much the presence or absence of a 'work ethic' as it is the meaning of work and the way it links, or fails to link, individuals to one another"  -Robert N. Bellah (sociologist)

I like to set an hour or so in the morning for us to work together on a home project. This is something I just recently started when I realized that we needed to work together more. It was kind of hard at first - for a couple of days, one particular child argued with me about it whenever we would start. An interesting thing took place after several days, though.

You know how growth and character development take place when we are going through hard times or reaching towards goals that make us stretch? I have found that this can apply to household work. In just the short time we have been doing this, I have seen the children increase in patience toward each other, in obedience towards me, in controlling their tempers, in kindness and helpfulness. My patience and capacity has increased as well.

One Saturday morning:

Playing in the leaf bags (this actually lasted hours):

For example, during the first few days - there was yelling and arguing towards me and towards each other. I would try to stay patient and set a good example, but it was difficult. We had morning devotionals about kind words, the importance of work, the growth that comes from doing hard things, etc. In the evenings, the child that seemed to struggle the most with this new schedule would apologize and say, "I know I apologize about this a lot, and you probably don't believe me when I apologize anymore, but I am sorry about how I acted today." I'd assure them that I noticed times where they had tried to be better and that I was happy as long as they were trying. This child would still have a bit of a fit the next day, but I did notice times when he/she would try not to. Eventually, this child got better and better at following directions and staying calm when things seemed unfair, or when getting teased, or when he/she simply did not want to work.


This child is still learning, but has come such a long way in such a short time just from being expected to do hard things even when not feeling like it. I have seen similar growth and bonding from the other kids as well.

Cleaning Appliances:

Anyway, what do we do during family project time? Isn't there always a project that I've been meaning to get to? That's what we do. So far we've cleaned out a couple of closets, cleared and cleaned our appliance/spice cabinet, cleaned out the fridge and freezer, organized books and school things, raked leaves, made apple cider from apples, cleaned out and organized the office/baby room, and organized the junk drawers (yes, there were two).

Alphabetizing the Spices:

 I've actually ran out of jobs on my "To do" list so now I'm starting to pick a job from our seasonal or monthly work cards (I talk about these here) These cards say things like, "Sweep the walk-way", "Clean light fixtures", "Vacuum living room furniture", "Clean kitchen windows", etc.  I don't, however, do things that I don't think need to be done just yet even if they're scheduled. Yesterday, I drew a card from the seasonal cards that said, "Clean living room light fixtures." I looked at them and thought, "Ahh, they look fine." and I decided to organize the little closet by the garage instead. I plan to start rotating them in on a schedule (they're already divided into which jobs I want to do on what months for the seasonal jobs and which jobs I want to do on what weeks for the monthly) whenever I don't have another project I want to do.

Wondering what the spices taste like:

As a side note, I also allow the kids to earn money by doing one of the "monthly" or "seasonal" cards on their own. They get a dollar for doing one card outside of family work time. I've opted to do this instead of giving them an allowance because the allowance thing wasn't working for us. They didn't seem to be valuing the money enough. There have been no takers yet (they still have money left from the allowance days), but maybe when they find something they really want...


It's been such a relief for me to have a time that I know can rely on to get the projects done that I've been wanting to get done. It's been great to get everyone involved because it's not so lonely, I think they are learning valuable skills, and we're bonding more as a family.

Sometimes someone's job is to "keep the baby happy":

I really love this new aspect of our family life. Like I've said before, the ability to do hard things (work) can transfer to anything we want to accomplish in life.

Tasting the spices:

Oregano is not so good by itself:

A job well done:

(P.S. I've added an update to this post)