How To Get Your Kids To Do Chores Without Yelling

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It’s a daily battle for parents. So, here is how to get your kids to do chores without yelling. It is easier than you think, and it is even a little fun! While this post is sponsored, all opinions are 100% my own.

How To Get Your Kids To Do Chores – Without Yelling

We have all been there.  When the simple task of making a bed ends up being a 45-minute debate.

Parent asks “Can you make your bed?”

Child replies “Yes”.

Then 30 minutes later child says “Can I go outside and play?”

Parent responds “Did you make your bed?”

Child says “No, but I will now.”

Then 15 minutes later child says “Can I go outside and play?”

Parent responds “Did you make your bed?”

Child responds “UGH, NO”

At this point is usually when my voice gets a bit louder just due to sheer frustration. I mean, how many times can we possibly ask the same question? And how many times can kids ignore us? But yet, it happens. ALL. THE. TIME.

So, how do we as parents fix this? Sure, there is the option of allowance, rewards, chore charts. And those are all great, I mean they worked when we were kids. Keywords… WHEN WE WERE KIDS. Things have changed, kids have changed, with the introduction of technology, the world has changed! Let’s start using that to our advantage.

And that is exactly why the folks that developed the Homey app. They brought the world of technology to chores.

What?

Homey is a mobile app for chores, rewards, and allowance. Their whole goal is to help teach kids financial responsibility and the value of work. Sounds like every parent’s dream if you ask me.

How does Homey work?

With Homey parents can set chores for their kids by taking a simple snapshot (so it works for younger kids too) and everybody gets notifications when their chores are due – so you don’t have to yell…I mean nag…I mean ask.

When kids complete chores they have to take a photo each time, so that parents know what got done at a glance. Each chore is worth a selected amount of coins (currency they can claim rewards with) and points (for responsibilities that are not paid) and when kids complete enough chores they can claim one of the rewards that their parents set – which can be allowance, a toy, screen time or anything else that parents choose.

By setting up a few rewards that differ in value, kids learn delayed gratification (to not use their coins for a $1 reward but to save up for that toy they want) which leads to better financial responsibility.

How do you get started with Homey?

1. Download the app – it’s FREE. Get the Homey app on Google Play. Get the Homey app in the Apple App Store.
2. Create a household and invite your family members or create profiles for them.
3. You, as the household creator, have all the features enabled. You will have set user roles for other family members based on their age, but you can customize all the permissions for everyone in the Household settings available in the sidebar.
4. Homey works best if every family member has it on their own device. But if you have a shared family device, they have some features to make that work. You can easily switch profiles by tapping the person you want to switch to in the sidebar and selecting “Switch profile” in the lower right corner (switching is needed for claiming rewards), or if you want to just mark chores your kids did as done while you’re logged in, you can simply long press the Mark as done button and select the right family member – the chore will be done in their name and they’ll get the points and coins.
5. Set chores.
6. Kids do chores.
7. Kids get rewarded for chores. If you’re on Android, you will see the Payouts screen. This is a new feature that enables better management of allowance. You can either set up regular (weekly) allowance and if you want you can make a requirement that responsibilities should be done and the kid should get a certain amount of points in that week. Or you can set up an extra monetary reward, where you can say they’ll get for instance $5 for every 50 coins, and it doesn’t matter how long they had those coins (they can do a lot of chores in one day, or get 50 coins in 3 months). And you can also set a due date on rewards (that goes for all rewards, not just monetary), which can come handy when you’re trying to motivate kids to earn extra money to buy something on a trip you’re already planning or something like that.
8. Parents are happy.
9. Kids are happy.
10. No yelling 🙂

 

Homey has been working with a child psychologist, who specializes in positive reinforcement, and they’ve just introduced separate points and coins. Points are like XP in games – experience points and aren’t be redeemable for rewards. “Coins” are the reward currency. This way you’re able to say which chores you’ll reward with allowance or screen time or anything else, and which chores are children’s responsibility and they won’t get paid to do them. These “responsibilities” will still be worth points (that they won’t be able to redeem for rewards), so they will be able to work the leader-board and in the future get achievements – they still get positive reinforcement. Because let’s be honest, there are things that the kids should just be doing as a part of their daily routine! I don’t know about you, but I still need to remind both kids on a daily basis to brush their teeth.

Download the Homey app – it’s FREE. Get the Homey app on Google Play. Get the Homey app in the Apple App Store.

Also, if you manage chores for yourself or your spouse in the app, you don’t have to give yourself any “Coins”, but you’ll still get XP. From interviews that Homey conducted, they learned that kids often didn’t know how much work their parents did at home, so seeing how many points mom and dad got made them appreciate them more and also complain less about how much chores they need to do. Okay, anyone else absolutely love this? I really think that the kids have NO IDEA how much we do in a day, so this is an easy way to show them…without actually pointing it out consistently.

I also wanted to let you guys know that Homey is working on developing a feature that will enable parents to transfer the money to the kid’s savings account if they have one. This helps teach kids financial literacy, promotes long-term goals, they could get interest on their savings, and it also makes dealing with allowance easier for parents. Stay tuned for more on that soon!

Download the Homey app – it’s FREE. Get Homey app on Google Play. Get Homey app in the Apple App Store.

What do you like best about the Homey app? What tips do you have for getting kids to do their chores?

Stay up to date with Homey on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, and Pinterest for all the latest updates and improvements.

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