[Iveyrock]

I'm not sure where to put this, because it covers special needs, homeschooling, and gentle discipline. This seemed like the best catch all spot, but I'm fine having it moved if that's better.

I am having constant issues with chores in the morning. There are several components to the problem.

Each morning, kids are supposed to clear the breakfast spot, make their bed (like, throw blankets back up, not anything hard) and tidy their room. Then they each have a chore they are supposed to get done. In theory, these things are supposed to get done before we start school for the day.

I have one kid who has a really hard time moderating himself, controlling his impulses, etc. It routinely takes him over an hour to do his chores. In theory, chores should be taking 15 to twenty minutes, depending on how messy their rooms are. (He doesn't play in his room, so it's not like it's a huge mess. Usually tidying means putting his lovies back on his bed.)

I have two other kids with developmental delays who occasionally need help/reminders/whatever to get their chores done.

I have one kid who loves knowing what he's supposed to do and doing it, and is very easy in the mornings.

Then I have my two oldest. I am particularly frustrated with both of them right now. If I am spending time trying to work with the littler kids, they are either not doing chores, being crazy and winding everyone else up, etc. I think my oldest and I have reached a solution for that, but my eight year old is just not doing stuff because... she doesn't want to. She's a great worker when she wants to be, and when she decides she doesn't want to do something, she just... doesn't.

So I feel like I am pulling teeth to get people to get through their stuff. Then I start the day frustrated, I'm running trying play catch up with all of the things that need helped with. There really isn't any natural consequence of not getting chores done except doing less school, and that's certainly not ok. Especially because the son who has the most trouble focusing on getting his chores done also needs the most help with school.

How can I switch things around? We have been doing get dressed/make bed/tidy room for as long as the kids can remember, so it's a pretty big anchor in our day. I could switch that up, but I'm not sure if it would help or make more chaos.

Recently I had been doing spiral notebooks for each kid, with their chores for the day to mark off. It helped the eight year old for a bit, but now she's bored with it and not interested.

There is a whole mix of attachment issues, developmental issues, language delay issues going on... so nothing is every simple for us.

I am contemplating for my kid who is really struggling with his chores pulling back his privileges, because he's really having trouble functioning right now. Not sure if that's a good idea or not. For the eight year old, I want to start giving her small extra jobs for every time I have to stop my work to come make her do hers - she is taking my time and energy. I don't know if that's the right approach either.

How do you all handle chores? Those that home school, how do you balance that and chores? How do you throw special needs into the mix? I feel like I have tried and tried to tweak this to set us all up for success, and I am out of creativity.

---------- Post added at 06:02 PM ---------- Previous post was at 05:54 PM ----------

Coming back to add that both kids I am struggling the most with are type Ones, if that helps give a larger picture of the whole thing.