Chores and the Candy Store

This idea is kind of a splicing of ideas from my friends Kathryn and Angie and my Mom.

The problem: Being consistant with enforcing chores, teaching my kids to love work, and giving them an opportunity to buy things on a meager allowance.

My solution: The Minute Game, and the Candy Store!

Stuff you need:

• A decorated can or jar
• LOTS of popcicle sticks
• Sharpie marker (fine tip works best)
• Paper or plastic cups (1 for each child)
• Stickers and stuff to decorate cups and can with
• Candy jars (I have 4, but you can do however many you want)
• A timer
• Penny candy
• Nickles (about 3 rolls worth)

I have a decorated can of popcicle sticks...each stick has a different chore written on it. All of them are chores that can either be finished or worked on for a minute or less. For jobs that can be done more than once, I have on more than one stick. At different times throughout the day, I will set the timer for one minute, let the kids pick a job, and we have a mad dash to each do our jobs for that minute. They think this is so fun, so we usually do it for about 20 minutes, but it's great because you can do it as long or short as you want. When they complete a job, they get to put their stick in a cup with their name on it. They can also earn blank popcicle sticks throughout the day if I see them doing something awesome or uber-wonderful. Then once a week (usually Family Night), we have our candy store. I got a few of those little candy jars, and bought a bunch of penny candies. I have candy corn, gumballs, swedish fishies, dum dum suckers, and so on. In one jar, I also have a bunch of nickles (the cash value of each popcicle stick is 5 cents). So they can use their sticks that they have earned throughout the week to either buy candy, or trade them in for money to save up for something else that they want. This has worked so great, because they know they can't earn popcicle sticks until their own basic chores are done, so they are more motivated, which is wonderful for me! They do get candy, but anymore, they usually only pick a few pieces, and then they just want money, so that has worked out well also.

My kids now ask to do chores so they can earn sticks. It works the best when I do it with them (which is a fun opportunity for me to be productive WITH my kids). When I am consistant, I have noticed a huge difference in their attitudes regarding work! It has been wonderful :)