No, I’m not saying the 8 year old has to be Cinderella while Mom sits around watching Oprah. I mentioned it because 1)My co-worker had to take the day off to clean her house and when I asked her she said 2)No, her 8 year old doesn’t know how to use the vaccuum. Surely 8 years old is not too young to ask a child to run a vacuum in say, a hallway or in their room? That’s not too much to help Mom keep things neat. If everyone pitches in on a Saturday, with everybody taking a room, it gets done quickly, and then Mom doesn’t have to use a vacation day to clean the entire house all by herself.
I think I must be stupider than usual today because I still don’t get the logical connection. I don’t know where Oprah comes into it, but it seems to me that you are saying that if the 8 year old did more around the house, the mother would not have to take time off work to do it. No?
If the mother and the second grader each took a room on a Saturday, it seems to me it would take about the same amount of time as if the mother did it all herself on a Saturday. Unless there are a lot of other unmentioned siblings/parents/farm hands hanging around. Or they live in a two room house.
Which does not mean that I think it is unreasonable to ask an eight year old to run a vacuum. Sure, that’s one way to help out, it’s a perfectly good one. But I don’t think it’s a Violation of All That is Holy not to do it, either.
Is it possible your coworker just felt like kicking around the house by herself for a day? My sister in law used to do this, and this when she had a 2BR apartment and no kids, I’m sure she didn’t “have” to take the day off, she just felt like it.
Lots of boys didn’t vacuum and iron when they’re little, I don’t see what the big deal is if a girl can’t vacuum either. Maybe her kid does yardwork or something? I did very little housecleaning but I helped with cooking and shoveled snow after my brother went to college.
My kids (11 & 15) were assigned to take care of dishes each night, with the result that they took forever to do them, did a mediocre job, and complained a lot about how much they hated to do dishes. They also turned a blind eye to every other chore, because “the dishes are my job!” My first inclination was to make them go right on with it, but we are trying an experiment. The new house rules are that every person does something every day to benefit the household. It could be anything, including non-cleaning chores such as cooking dinner or feeding the cats. My husband and I have taken on the dishes.
We’re tweaking this as we go along. My hope is that the kids will learn to see what needs doing around the house, and how easy it is to take care of, especially when everybody pitches in.
As to the OP, my stepchildren (both 16) are very well off materially, don’t have any responsibilities that I know of, and don’t face much in the way of punishment when they screw up. The boy has already gotten caught doing some stuff with potentially serious consequences and the girl has dabbled with pot. I am keeping a very interested eye on that whole situation.
I haven’t read everybody’s stories. I want to share mine first, then I’ll go back and read them.
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My half-brother.
The eldest is now 18, and he won’t work and he won’t go to college. His mother needs him to work but she won’t push him. He is quite fat and gets out of having to do any work by crying it’s too hard and saying he can’t do the physical part of it.
They were so cute when they were babies…sigh -
My cousin on my father’s side.
Granted, last time I saw him was 20 years ago, when he was 8 and I was 10 or so. I remember the following things:
- He never listened to his mother.
- When she yelled at him once, he hit her on the face. And then ran around in circles going YaYa Ya while she cried.
- His father would occasionally start to smack him or spank him. But she would yell “No, don’t beat him, all you do is beat him, you’re a horrible man.” I never once saw him lay a hand on the boy.
- My cousins in India on my mother’s side.
The eldest is a wife-beater and sometimes a father-beater. The second is a druggie. But they’re boys, and the eldest in my generation to boot, so of course they’re all fine and dandy. :rolleyes:
I can only tell you what she told me, that her house was such a wreck, she was the only one cleaning it, and that she had to take a day off to get it straight. I found it odd that her daughter couldn’t or wouldn’t help.
Marienee, the point I’m trying to make is that children should know how to do chores, not only to help contribute to the household, but so they can know how to do them when they grow up and are on their own. I think parents who don’t assign their children chores are doing them a disservice.
Dung Beetle, I think that’s an ingenious idea. Let me know how it turns out!
I didn’t do many chores as a child and I certainly wasn’t spoiled! I was told “You’d only screw it up anyhow. You can’t do anything right.” :rolleyes: again.
There’s where we part company. 
We got all the necessities and a modest set of presents on birthdays and Christmas. And a very modest allowance for candy and the like (25 cents when we were little). I don’t think I really knew what to ask for, since we were pretty isolated socially.
I didn’t have to clean up my room much and didn’t have daily chores. I was sort of spoiled. It was a shock to me when I moved out and the apartment didn’t magically clean itself.
Eight is not too young to run a vacuum. My son is 6 and he can do it. My youngest son is 2 and at that age they can help unload a dishwasher (by handing you forks, for example), take their plate to the counter, pick up toys, turn off lights, help with laundry by standing by the dryer as I hand him things to throw in, the list can go on. The 2 y/o isn’t in charge of a chore by any means, but he is learning that we all clean up our own messes. The 6 y/o is responsible for remembering to put his plate up when finished with dinner and he helps me dust or vacuum on weekends. They both love being involved and the importance they get from doing a job, and I like the help. They are also both responsible for putting their backpacks in the designated areas when we get home from school and putting their shoes in their room.
I think I am definitely going to have two boys that are much more prepared for the real world than I was.
My kids are essentially responsible for their own stuff - keeping their rooms clean and doing laundry, etc. I don’t have them do much else. Their lives are full of extra curricular things from soccer in the sring and fall (at least 4 days a week), basketball in the winter and violin all year round. The lessons they’re learning about teamwork, self-discipline, dedication and competition are more important to me than having them pull weeds or dust.
They’re also in great shape and have tons of friends due to all their outside activities. I wouldn’t let them near an iron until they turn 17. I barely trust myself to use one.
So far, so good. There was one time that my son played at his friend’s house all day, so he didn’t have anything done when we had our nightly chore discussion. Thus, he had to do dishes.
However, last night, my daughter walked right in the house and ran around doing some light chores first thing, so she could go sit down and relax. The house stays dusted all the time because that’s the easiest chore there is. Last night, my son couldn’t find anything else to do, so he scrubbed the toilet in his bathroom. There’s a lot less tension in the household too.
I dated a guy who had been spoiled completely rotten by his parents. Whatever Guy wanted, Guy got. Guy never had to lift a finger around the household. No one ever said “no” to Guy.
Until he dated me. And made irrational requests (he was almost a year younger and wanted me to wait a year to learn to drive because it wasn’t right that the female should drive first) And I said no. And he flipped out.
He had no idea how to deal with people telling him no. He was such a spoiled brat that he had trouble making friends. His parents tried to buy him friends with entertainment and lavish gifts. (his mother promised me a grand piano if I stuck around; later she warned me to leave her son, as any person who could push around his own mother was trouble)
Allowing your child to reach the age of 15 without teaching them that the world does not revolve around them is spoiling. As far as I know, he’s 29yrs old and still living off mom and pop, and still has trouble with interpersonal relationships.
As far as household work goes, my goal is for my children to have a full understanding of the basics of what is required to run a household by the time they are adults. By the time they graduate high school, I expect they will have learned how to clean, cook, and do laundry. They will learn by doing. I haven’t figured out the exact timelines thereof, but they’re still very little. The 3yr old is expected to help pick up her toys and clean up her own messes, and she loves to help dust (but I don’t expect that love to last).
How about an experience as a spoiled child?
My parents were actually VERY much like the OP of the other thread. I got everything I wanted and was raised upper middle class. Lots of traveling, nice clothes, shiny toys and gadgets, new cars. We had a housekeeper. And, much like the OP of the other thread, when I graduated my parents decided the “gravy train” was stopping. Only no one had ever told me it was a gravy train. No one had ever taught me any skills for living, managing money, making do with what I had. I don’t know how they expected me to know how to live within my means, considering I’d never had limits before, but they did. Imagine how shocked they were when I got myself deep into credit card debt just trying to keep up with what I thought was normal. (And then I learned the hard way how to be a grown up)
To this day (thought we’ve had some frank conversations) they are insistant that there was nothing wrong with doing it that way-- I was an adult, and I should have known better. It’s like people don’t realize that you actually have to train children-- you have to teach them how to be functional adults. They don’t just magically know it on their 18th birthday (or learn it from TV).
So Obsidian, you were basically “blind” since birth and then suddenly given sight, with no training on how to deal with your new sense?
I think that’s the key, right there (and congrats on your success).
Maybe it’s selfish, but I believe I’m entitled to enjoy my life; when my kids and I are clashing, things have to change. Sometimes it’s their behavior, and sometimes it’s my expectations. I keep learning about rules that work for us – I think being able to work together is so much more important than whether or not a kid learns to iron. It’s not like the world operates according to some particular schedule of tasks, cohabiting adults divide housework any number of ways.
-> aaaand, right now, my kids are busy smearing blue tempera paint all over their naked selves. How I love our “Messy Room” 
. I told them there’s more mopping in their future.
I always wonder how parents of intolerable children feel about their home life. Those kids can’t possibly be behaving any better when they’re home alone, they have to be driving those parents nuts with the whining and bullying.
As I mentioned, my daughter has just started middle school (6th grade). She has an elective during the last period of the day. It is a “wheel” system, so it starts as one subject, then another, then another, until the end of this cycle, then they chose one or two electives that interest them most. She starts with we would have called “Home Economics” back in the day, now they call it “Family and Consumer Science”. They will focus on Life Skills and Life Choices. Topics include:
- Time Management
- Leadership Skills
- The Importance of Attitude
- Nutrition and Food Choices
- House and Living Space
- Banking
- Comparative Buying
- Friends
- Childcare
- Goal Setting and Self Esteem
- Employment
- Manners and Courtesy
- Grooming
Now, some of this sounds kind of fluffly/new-age-y, but overall I’m glad they’re trying to teach it. Not every kid is exposed to this stuff, and most of these topics are things that kids should learn. You can make the argument that they should learn many of them at home, but we have seen that this is not always the case. My only concern is that this is one of very many classes that kids have during this period, and a lot of it may not “stick”. But at least they’ll have been exposed to the concepts.
I have had chldren as young as three in my office learn to “help me out.”
You want to draw. Here’s the paper and pens. Make sure you give me the pens back and take the papers when you leave.
You want to eat? Throw away all the paper and unfinished food when you’re done. Here’s a wet towel. Wipe off the desk please.
Hey, can you help me out and be a “runner.” You know what a “runner” does? You run these pepers up to Joanne on the second floor (five steps up and to the back). Wow, you are a good runner.
Can you go in the back and get me the book wih the red sticker on it. You know what red is, right? (All the checkbooks are color coded according to which account they are. Great for three year old assistants).
Hey, you helped me so well I’m done with my work. Let’s tell a story about this great picture you drew. And you get a sticker for being such a good helper. What color do you want?
ETA: Of course, the main reason this works is that I start it the first time they are in the office, so they know what to expect. Children like to feel wanted and needed and love routine. They need to know what is expected of them.
Exactly. When my kid got her first apartment, I wasn’t too terribly worried about her because I knew she could cook and do laundry and run a vacuum and dishwasher. She’ll still call me once in a while for advice on how to do something, but she’s pretty well equipped to function as an independent adult in society.
My niece, on the other hand, called my mother to ask her how to boil water. Honestly, the girl didn’t know what a “rolling boil” was! :eek: And the kicker is, I gave her a cookbook called “How to boil water” - and it didn’t address how to boil water! I should demand my money back. I should also smack my sister for not teaching her daughter something so basic.
When I think of spoiled I think of my step-brother.
My Dad is always complaining that he’s over there (he puts his foot down and he gets in shit and backs off, that’s a whole other host of issues not related to this though), eating up their food and such. Until recently him and his fiancee lived in the basement. He can’t keep down a job at all (or so it seems to me, he’s constantly job hopping though he went to driving school and got his class 3 iirc and there are TONS of jobs out there for drivers now) and he’s got a bad attitude, constantly swearing and acting like a tough guy. Step-mom constantly buys him smokes and lotto tickets and makes sure his bills are paid. His fiancee is the one who consistently works from what I can tell and is a very mothering soul (though she gives him his bullshit right back so I guess they are made for each other).
Earlier this year she had paid for him and his fiancee to go out East and live there with his father’s family, get a job etc. Well they kicked him out so he called Mommy and is coming home again.
And my Step-mom says I am spoiled, and my brother. Okay, I am a bit. I admit it, but I don’t go running to Mommy or Daddy anytime I need something and I manage to pay my own way and am a reasonably responsible adult compared to him.
I think there’s a thin line separating “overprotected” and “spoiled”. So when I hear about parents who don’t let their teenage kids stay home alone, or parents who seem to know their kids class schedules better than they do, I often wonder if there is also spoiling involved.
My sister has two girls, and sometimes I think our parents think they’re being spoiled. The kids aren’t afraid to talk to their adults and express opinions (like we were taught NOT to do, growing up). They don’t get spankings, they have busy after-school lives, and they don’t have to do the chores we were forced to do, growing up. Like doing the dishes. Another difference is that my sister is really really active in her kids’ lives. She’s a PTA mom, a stage mother (my niece is in a theater troupe), and is the quintessential soccer mother. She’s now a part-time stay-at-home mother. Our mother was a career mom. She wasn’t home when we got home from school. My sister, who’s a loving person who needs to know other people love her, carries that legacy with her. She’s giving her kids a childhood she feels she didn’t have.
But I don’t think they’re spoiled. I just think they have more ideal childhoods–the kind my parents never had and didn’t know how to provide for us (we weren’t abused or anything, but we had some great moments of dysfunction). They would be spoiled, however, if it weren’t for my sister’s non-reluctance to yell and threaten through body language. Her kids have a longer leash than we had, but she’s always there to reign them in. I like visiting her house. They have fun.