Mar 3, 2012

How to Encourage Young Children to Make Their Own Beds

Teaching your child to make their bed will be one of their earliest lessons in personal responsibility you will impart on them. It doesn’t take much to make your bed, and considering that they slept in it, it really is their job. The following are ways to teach your child to make their bed sooner rather than later:

Do It Early
As soon as you move your child from their crib to their own bed, get them to make their bed. Obviously you will want to help them for a while, though make it clear that this is just something that you do when you have your own bed, and that having your own bed is awesome. Buying them their own special
bed linen, whether it has Spiderman, flowers or dinosaurs on it, will definitively help to have your child interested in the state of their bed.

Make Yours
If you don’t make your own bed then it’s going to be pretty hard convincing your child that they should do theirs, as they are going to want to do things the way that you do them. Make a big show of you making your bed and then offer to tell them the secret of how you do it. Kid’s love secrets, and you’ll have them feeling sneaky and special making their own bed the ‘secret way,’ just like mum or dad.

Make It Routine
Have making their bed part of your child’s morning routine, along with brushing their teeth and everything else they need to do. It only takes a couple of minutes at most to make a bed, so all it will take is you requiring that they do it; whether they like it or not, and your child will realise they simply have to make the bed. Hopefully by the time they aren’t living at home, they will realise the advantages of a made bed and will choose to continue with the practice.

Reward Them
Instead of giving your child pocket money, give them money for doing tasks like making their bed, cleaning their room, or helping with the grocery shopping. This will get them into the habit of making their bed, among other chores, and help them earn some money at the same time.

Tell Them An Elaborate StoryIf you are creative enough or have a friend who can spin a good yarn, make up a story to tell your child, where the big hero ends up being a child who makes their bed. The longer and more elaborate the better, and you may be able to include other lessons too, for example with a heroine who always brushes her teeth. Obviously the elaborate story style will only work with young children, as older kids will have more questions, either way it had better be a good story.

Some children are pretty easy to get interested in neatness and order, whereas others are a bit more of a challenge. Regardless you can generally convince kids that something is a good idea if you are creative and persistent enough.

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