Wednesday, March 2, 2016

6 Minutes to Clean Home

Delegate. It's easier said than done. It involves communication...the last thing you may want to do when you're home feel like it's imploding with dirty (and clean) clothes, toys, crumbs and various craft material. Here's how to get a room clean in a matter of minutes. Six minutes to be exact.

  1. Get your kids together and grab a broom and three buckets/bags. I have three cleaners (aged 3, almost-5 and almost-7) and I wear the 1 year-old (otherwise he would be underfoot or undoing everyone's work). 
  2. Assign each kid with a job. For example, garbage and recycling man, laundry girl and toy and books boy.  
  3. Motivate them by telling them the plan and the reward at the end. We do four six-minute cleans, changing rooms every six minutes, and at the end, I let them invite a friend over for a play date or watch a video (usually they have to pay me 1 ticket for every 20 minutes of video time).
  4. Set the timer for six minutes. Six minutes seems to be the right amount of time my kids can focus on a job for now. As they get older, I may extend it to 10 minutes. 
  5. I'm the sweeper for now. I sweep everything into the middle of the room and everyone else picks up their assigned items from the pile.
  6. Clean with your kids, but be sure to watch what the kids are doing too. DO NOT check you your phone or get distracted yourself, do not put on music, do not yell at your children at this time. You are setting an example for your children - showing them how to clean, so it's important to give instructions that bring awareness to detail. 
  7. Be positive and be sure to praise everyone for their efforts!
When the first six minutes is up, move on to the next room. In 24 minutes, we can get four rooms reasonably clean! I'll also do a six minute clean in the dining room just before and after dinner, as well as one in the car if we're waiting for something. It's been remarkably effective! 

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