Suggestions to get kids to clean up their toys?...

[Dandelion]

Seems to be a constant struggle for us. I feel like I have to nag to get them to do anything. When they do clean up they often do a terrible job, only picking up half of the stuff and putting most of it in the wrong place. I need some practical ideas.

[Singingmom]

Several things help us.  Having a routine cuts back on the whining because they know clean up time is coming before snack time or before Daddy gets home, etc.

It might also help to make clean up time come before something they're looking forward to... snack time, a tv show, playing outside. (Let's get the job done so we can ...) When my dd says she wants me to get down her farm, I'll tell her we have to clean up xxx first to make room to play with the farm, and she'll get down to business so she can have the farm. (Maybe keeping larger toys or toys with lots of little pieces out of reach would work well for you.)

Also, when the messes get big, it's often time for me to reevaluate our toy situation and take it down to basics by giving away things, tossing anything broken, putting some toys in the attic for a while, etc. 

It sounds like you already have a place for everything, which is important.  If they're doing a bad job, stay with them and help or supervise.  I don't know how old they are... you might think you shouldn't have to do that at their ages, but maybe until they get better at it you do need to be right there. 

Hope some of this helps! :)

[Amythestmama]

How old are they? Dd will pick up when asked but if I'm not right there working with her, then I have point out each item that needs to be picked up and where it should go. It frustrates her though that ds often will dump out what we just picked up. :doh He's not so helpful. :giggle

[klpmommy]

We make clean up time a group effort. Often that means that the kids are bringing me toys & I am putting them where they belong. We make clean up a game (they are currently liking rolling a dice to see how many things they have to pick up & bring me at a time). We have severely limited the # of toys out- they don't get overwhelmed making a big mess, but they sure do cleaning it up. So we rotate toys on a "weekly" basis so that they don't have an overwhelming mess to clean up.

I also give them specific tasks- "P clean up the sleep friends, E clean up the dinosaurs" or "P bring me all the toys from the formals, E bring me all the toys from the kitchen" (Yes, our toys end up EVERYWHERE.) We do it at bedtime so it is important that there isn't an overwhelming mess & I also have to catch them before they get too tired or they meltdown almost immediately.

BTW- this is one of my biggest struggles. I really need the clean up fairy to show up at my house every night & clean up not only the kid toys but my kitchen.

[J3K]

Maybe instead of very specific places for toys (trucks on the third shelf from the bottom and legos in the tub on the top shelf)...maybe you could just have a giant tub ? or a bare minimum of containers? (barbies and their gear in this tub....cars and roads in this tub , legos and other building blocks in this tub...)

For me , tub-bing was the way to go. By eliminating all the specific containers and making three generic containers made clean up soooo much more fun and easier too. It didn't feel so daunting to little people.

To get them to actually put things away , we'd play "basketball". If the item was tossable , they'd toss it in the tub at the end of the hallway. OR the "see how much you can carry at once" game was fun too. Or the "everything with wheels first..." "everything blue next" "favorite toys last "....

[MamaJayne]

Specific individual directives with as few words as possible work well. Such as, "Books go on the shelf," and "Cars go in the blue bin" get the job done here, especially when given one at a time so that each child has a specific task to work on.