Kids are wired to want to learn things. Learning is fun, because play is semi-structured learning.
You can see this in other species too, where pups and kittens play at hunting and fighting, and it comes with a number of important corollaries.
First one is that a major part of this learning experience is emotional, not just technical. You’re not just teaching your child to wash the dishes, you’re also teaching them how to feel about washing the dishes. If you act like chores are something to be avoided, your kids will learn that from you. If you resent your kids not helping, they’ll learn that too.
Second is that kids never stop learning, so you never stop teaching. If you act like you resent chores all day, then try to act enthusiastic about doing them as a way to get your kid to help, they’ll catch on to the deception really quickly.
Third, your kids are not always learning the lessons you want to teach them. If you want to punish them for misbehaving, don’t do that by giving them chores. Chores = punishment teaches the exact opposite of what you want them to learn!
> First one is that a major part of this learning experience is emotional, not just technical. You’re not just teaching your child to wash the dishes, you’re also teaching them how to feel about washing the dishes. If you act like chores are something to be avoided, your kids will learn that from you. If you resent your kids not helping, they’ll learn that too.
That really works! When my friend was a kid, his older sister pretended that vacuuming the apartment (something she was made to do by the parents) was the coolest thing in the world. As a result, my friend was dying to take the vacuum from her and do the job himself.
It’s more than just how one feels about chores and involves the world view and paradigm.
Indigenous families typically have a world view in which a member of the community voluntarily contributes towards something to the greater community. Some tasks are so important that someone somewhere has to do it, and it is less about individual responsibility. And this extends not just to “chores”, but the care of people and care of the land.
So this isn’t a “chore”, something someone is forced to do, perhaps even a punishment. If a modern family tries to implement this without dropping the individualist frame, there is a tension in trying to get the child to do something that you yourself don’t really want to do, yet must do as an “adult”.
It’s why for my kids, household chores are never done in order to get money. It’s a bit too late to instill this for my teenage step-daughter, but it is something we’re implementing for our 15-month old son.
Carol Sanford has written a book called Regenerative Life that describes the kind of world view and paradigm for this, and it is informed from her being raised by her Mohawk grandfather. When she adapted this to her children, she asked her two children what they wanted to contribute. Her 9 year old daughter wanted to pay the bills, and her even younger son wanted to cook dinner. She didn’t throw them into the deep end, and instead acted as a resource and helped developed their individual capacity to contribute in that way. When they were older, the daughter joined an athletic program and wanted to go on a special diet. She collaborated with her brother about her needs. He gathered the ingredients and cooked it for her, and she worked out the budget for it.
This kind of stuff can go beyond just doing chores.
When it comes to dishes, there is one thing I have found that seems to work universally for children and adults alike: give them ownership. They have their own set of dishes, and it is made clear that it is their responsibility to clean them and keep them, and to not have them be in the way of others trying to do the same. If your dish is not clean, you must clean it before it can be used.
Things get hairier when it comes to pots and pans and other such common use items, but I have found that the second part of the above helps here too: make sure you're not blocking others from keeping their stuff clean. This leads to washing as you go, to caring for your stuff, and to a sense of pride in your work.
I got a kid who "does the chores". The reason they do it is that they've been educated since very young age (3+) to have responsibilities: cleaning, tidying up, setting/clearing the table and so on. They have their own hoover and drying rack.
I believe it's ultimately a matter of underlying philosophy of treating children like "young adults" or not, with all the consequences, as the roles are set from very young age.
I know parents who are horrified when they hear about 5 years old children cleaning up after themselves; with their model though, they set the role of "incapable children" and "providing parents" - "teaching" them to do the "chores" later will be hard, because it's not in the role they've taught.
I also disagree with the term "chore". It's true that they're boring, but this term disconnects tasks from their purposes; if nobody, say, sets and clears the table, nobody can eat. It's crucial to have in mind that chores/tasks always have a purpose. If a child is grown up as "incapable", there's no connection between task and purpose, and actually, it's rational to refuse to perform any task ("chore"), because it's part of somebody else's responsibilities (the "providing parent").
On a documentary, a couple of blind people had a daughter. She kinda helped in every tasks, and with a natural care. It was a deep collaboration all the time. To me it's as if being blind made her parents unable to play games (being selfish, bossy, lying) with the girl, and included her in everything as a team member, and she naturally rose to the challenge by giving her full attention. Maybe I'm wrong but it left a strong memory in me.
Intuitively I expect that the earlier the pattern is set, the easier it will be later. I don't think chores need to be spun as anything other than what they are; I'm a fully grown adult and don't care for a good deal of them, but I have the ingrained habit not to defer them indefinitely. Once you get going it's not so bad, I do a lot of daydreaming during routines.
On the other hand, I don't think I would have a hefty list of expectations. You're only a child once. My labor expectations are low, I just want them to have constructive / creative go-to activities when playing. Overscheduling or putting them to work all the time just robs them of childhood experience that they'll never get again. Putting away toys and cleaning up after a mess is a reasonable ask, as they need to learn to take care of themselves and not live like slobs into adulthood.
> [...] rinses the dishes for the dishwasher [...]
Is that a thing in the US? My current dishwasher is from 2015, stock standard Ikea.
I never had to rinse anything for it to come out sparkling clean. Even in the fast program that only runs 64mins.
The other day I had an Airbnb guest from NYC and I saw him rinsing. And when asked why he told me that was necessary because the dishwasher couldn't cope with it otherwise and stuff would come out dirty.
He looked perplexed when I told him no dishwasher I used for over twenty years required rinsing beforehand.
Is this 'rinsing requirement' an urban myth sticking around in some areas of the world?
Edit: I live in Berlin but have been living in Australia, the UK, Japan and Italy over the last two decades. No dishwashers in the apartments I lived in in those countries required rinsing either.
Do you run the dishwasher as soon as you put items in it, or do put items in throughout the day but not run it until it's full?
I wonder if some of the disagreement over this is because food becomes more stuck on the longer one leaves it, and so rinsing is needed if you are not going to start the dishwasher for another 12-18 hours?
Dishwasher pods are heavily marketed in the US and actually wash more poorly compared to plain powder. With pods the pre-wash ends up running without detergent, so rinsing off dishes becomes necessary.
For the most part (ignoring old/damaged washers) it's just a holdover from the older generation. My parents and their parents did it, and I expect many of my cohort follow through by example. However, I do not rinse and the results come out the same.
The only caveat being that you will still get dirty spots if you over fill or place poorly certain shaped things. This happens regardless of rinsing, and I believe contributes to the myth
My garbage whirlpool dishwasher looks to be from the 90s and a cheap version from back then. I can put a clean plate in it and it might come out dirty. Also part of the rental and my landlord is impossible to deal with so here we are.
It doesn’t have a removable filter, just some sort of grille in the back that I have to clean between loads and the shitty texture makes it grip crap like Velcro, not fun.
Dishwasher soap in the US is garbage now, so you have to scrub anything that might possibly stick on, despite the wash cycle on my dishwasher taking nearly two and a half hours.
Wait, 12 yo in the US don't know how to do chores or do not understand how a house is set up?
Ok, I'll give you the Maya method, or the French method, or the Japanese method, or the Hacker method, or wherever we figured out parenting from in our household:
make kids feel they are part of the adults group. Share tasks, concerns, information, understanding. My 7 yo is (clumsily) washing his dishes because the rule is that if you don't cook, you wash dishes. That before going back to play, we clean the table. It is the rule for everyone, adults or kids.
We don't fake enjoyment of the chores, we explain its usefulness, we (well, I) do complain a lot about them, and my kid sometimes does it too, but still does it without being told.
Kids learn by imitation and they want to belong to your group. Give them what they want there. Set the example, be fair, be honest.
This is part of a larger divide between "childhood" and "real life" that we set up to a great extent in the US. Childhood innocence is fetishized in the US in a particular way, edging very much into what we allow to be taught in schools or consider inappropriate in schools. There is a deep emphasis on trying to not have kids feel bad and adults project all kinds of their own s*(& on that.
It contrasts with a different point of view, that kids are just people, and people need to 1) take part in chores and work to make life function, and 2) sometimes feel bad because life is hard (either feel bad because they messed up, or because something happened to someone else). Chores can be fun, chores can be a drag, attitude matters -- but in the end food needs to be cooked and dishes need to be cleaned, no way around that. I think our culture in the US tries to avoid these realities and wants children to live a dream. From my point of view, though, it is a gesture of respect to include my child in the important work of running a house. Moreover, this child will be better-prepared for life if they can prepare food, manage a budget, fix clothing and mechanical problems, build some basic items, etc. I met too many folks in college who couldn't cook rice or wash their own laundry. That is not a setup for success. You can have a lot more fun if you can make a fancy ramen dinner and have your friends over to your crappy apartment that is decently furnished because you can manage curtains and bookshelves than if you need to pay $$ for all of the above. I have as much book learning as a person in the US can expect to have, but I really respect the lessons I learned from my elders about cooking, cleaning, preparing items from nature/fabric/wood, fixing stuff. Those lessons came from childhood involvement in chores. They carried over quite well to an engineering school education and then into the corporate world (see "tech debt").
My kid spent the weekend playing, learning how to change tires on the car, mixing pizza dough and getting toppings together, cleaning the living room, watching Disney music videos (no no no), and planting seeds for our seed starting. Just do stuff as part of life and include the kid to the extent they can participate.
Ah yes, the "kids would love chores if only parents did it right!" argument. I assume all readers in this thread love doing all of their chores all of the time. "Yay, I can't wait to clean the litterbox again!" "Oh good, I get to clean all of the dishes again!" "Sweet, it's 95F out and I get to mow the lawn!"
Seriously? I can get some simple joy from doing some chores, but most of them I'd happily give up. Kids aren't dumb, they figure things out real quick. They are also wired like their parents, and so if the parents like to do dishes and vacuum, the kids are likely to enjoy the same. I hate, and have always hated, mowing the lawn. I've done it for the vast majority of my life. Try to engage my son all you want, and he'll still hate it. Some people love mowing the lawn, I wish I was one of them!
Parenting is tough - read articles like these, try the techniques out, but don't feel bad if it doesn't work out. 99% of this content has been useless to me, but I do find 1% that helps. Just don't beat yourself up over it if it doesn't work.
Getting 2 years old try to do chores is as easy as not preventing it - they still learn to control their motions and eager to apply it everywhere. The trick is to get that continue past 4 years where the novelty wears off.
I believe functioning adults naturally do chores provided they get to choose what, when and most importantly how.
Most of the conflicts I had with my SO regarding chores were about the way things should be done not if.
Also it helps to assign responsibility - I have a friend who went as far as starting a family JIRA instance(it's frer for teams of up to 10). It's likely that it saved his marriage.
My spouse is into having things very, very clean (from my perspective, at least). When we moved in together (over a decade ago) we negotiated household duties - basically wrote them all out and ranked them by how much we hated doing them, then optimized the division of labor to achieve least total pain…
Here’s the thing - in that process we found fundamental disagreements on what’s important to clean up in the first place. Life’s too short to make beds… Rooms have doors for a reason… listing out what we each expected really helped launch a conversation about compromise about doing things at all, as much as it did who would do things. I’m a lot cleaner now because I know exactly what she wants, and she’s a lot more flexible and accepting of my messes because she knows it’s not my default and I’m trying for her.
Read Skinner. Conditioning can do wonders. You can train people like you train dogs, though there is a catch: people must not notice that they are being trained.
From ethics standpoint it is an arguable approach, so you need to think before choosing this path. I believe that something can be done about people not noticing the training, if you manage to frame this training in a manner that doesn't reject their illusion of a free will. But I'm not sure, because never tried. Though when you openly thank people for their help, it is a kind of reinforcement, and therefore conditioning. But it works worse then when reinforcement sneaks in without consciousness noticing it.
I always thought the allowance system worked ok, but this might be better? Starting at around 5yo my parents would reward my chores with weekly allowance money (usually a few bucks a week). If I neglected my responsibilities, my allowance was reduced that week. They would explain the reasoning for the lower reward and I would often make it up by doing a different chore. They laid it out with an explanation along the lines of: "if you do x, you get the pay, if I do x, I keep the pay". Even to a 5yo that just seemed fair and it would encourage me to pick up extra chores in hopes of getting a few extra bucks. I learned fast that doing nothing meant I had little control over the purchase of Batman Action figures and video game cartridges.
Extrinsic motivation (which is what this is) is tricky for several reasons.
First of all, it kills intrinsic motivation. Once you start to reward someone materially for behaviour, you have to continue in perpetuity because they no longer see any reason to do the thing "for its own reward", as we say.
Second, you replace an imperative (one washes one's dishes) with a business transaction (is the proposed payout really superior to the opportunity loss of my time?)
Third, you introduce odd incentives to optimise and find loopholes that allow you to get away with as little as possible for as much as possible.
It simply becomes a very different game. It seems like that worked out for you, which is great, but I'd be very careful about doing it with my children.
This works well to get the chore done, as a captive supply of low wage labor. If the goal is rather to instill a set of responsible habits that will serve the child in adulthood, the allowance system might fail when a “Deus ex machina” is no longer present to reward or punish.
This completely failed with me. I wasn’t interested in the money and was very happy that I no longer needed to do chores. My parents abandoned the approach after about 6 weeks.
If this resonates with you, check out Montessori. I think learning (or, rather, retaining) appreciation for "work" is an important part of why Montessori is so successful.
This can also be learned later in life. As a teen I didn’t help much or complained and expected compensation for chores. When I joined the army you were expected to always pitch in, and there were no janitors, so you’re always cleaning and maintaining things yourself. Fast forward 25 years and I’ll be the first to volunteer to do dishes, will see a floor or vacuum without asking, and always willing to pitch in on a hard, physical task without hesitation.
The method I try to use with the kid is to involve her in what I’m doing, and enable and encourage playing at being an adult. That translates a lot into doing some of the housework. Other than that I try to avoid rewards for work, but I do a “no doing the thing you want until you do the thing you need to do” rule. So some amount of work needs to get done before TV time, but it is a fine line to walk to make sure the reward doesn’t ruin intrinsic motivation.
Wonder what the effect is of having close-aged siblings? There was little chance I would voluntarily do the dishes or fold laundry by myself while my siblings were doing something else. (But was this because my siblings were doing something else, or because I had learned to hate chores already?)
This is kind of a sample of the author’s book on her experience learning and applying non-western parenting approaches from traditional cultures, which is well worth reading (or listening to on Audible). The book is titled: Hunt, Gather, Parent but she actually only visits one hunter gatherer group.
The goal is not to "get kids to do chores" per se, but to raise adults who are self sufficient and self reliant. "Chores" is a bit of a loaded word because I think a lot of people associate it with dread and a sort of low key undeserved punishment, which is certainly not the goal. In this context it is more akin to having a child pass you pegs while you are trying to hang the washing on the line as opposed to parking them in front of a screen or compete for your attention.
That makes me feel good about having the 3-year-old help with pancakes this morning. It became our weekend daddy-daughter activity last month. She's always demanding to make pancakes and demanding to be involved in the process.
[+] [-] pdpi|4 years ago|reply
Kids are wired to want to learn things. Learning is fun, because play is semi-structured learning.
You can see this in other species too, where pups and kittens play at hunting and fighting, and it comes with a number of important corollaries.
First one is that a major part of this learning experience is emotional, not just technical. You’re not just teaching your child to wash the dishes, you’re also teaching them how to feel about washing the dishes. If you act like chores are something to be avoided, your kids will learn that from you. If you resent your kids not helping, they’ll learn that too.
Second is that kids never stop learning, so you never stop teaching. If you act like you resent chores all day, then try to act enthusiastic about doing them as a way to get your kid to help, they’ll catch on to the deception really quickly.
Third, your kids are not always learning the lessons you want to teach them. If you want to punish them for misbehaving, don’t do that by giving them chores. Chores = punishment teaches the exact opposite of what you want them to learn!
[+] [-] burntoutfire|4 years ago|reply
That really works! When my friend was a kid, his older sister pretended that vacuuming the apartment (something she was made to do by the parents) was the coolest thing in the world. As a result, my friend was dying to take the vacuum from her and do the job himself.
[+] [-] hosh|4 years ago|reply
Indigenous families typically have a world view in which a member of the community voluntarily contributes towards something to the greater community. Some tasks are so important that someone somewhere has to do it, and it is less about individual responsibility. And this extends not just to “chores”, but the care of people and care of the land.
So this isn’t a “chore”, something someone is forced to do, perhaps even a punishment. If a modern family tries to implement this without dropping the individualist frame, there is a tension in trying to get the child to do something that you yourself don’t really want to do, yet must do as an “adult”.
It’s why for my kids, household chores are never done in order to get money. It’s a bit too late to instill this for my teenage step-daughter, but it is something we’re implementing for our 15-month old son.
Carol Sanford has written a book called Regenerative Life that describes the kind of world view and paradigm for this, and it is informed from her being raised by her Mohawk grandfather. When she adapted this to her children, she asked her two children what they wanted to contribute. Her 9 year old daughter wanted to pay the bills, and her even younger son wanted to cook dinner. She didn’t throw them into the deep end, and instead acted as a resource and helped developed their individual capacity to contribute in that way. When they were older, the daughter joined an athletic program and wanted to go on a special diet. She collaborated with her brother about her needs. He gathered the ingredients and cooked it for her, and she worked out the budget for it.
This kind of stuff can go beyond just doing chores.
[+] [-] jimmygrapes|4 years ago|reply
Things get hairier when it comes to pots and pans and other such common use items, but I have found that the second part of the above helps here too: make sure you're not blocking others from keeping their stuff clean. This leads to washing as you go, to caring for your stuff, and to a sense of pride in your work.
inb4 commies /s
[+] [-] pizza234|4 years ago|reply
I believe it's ultimately a matter of underlying philosophy of treating children like "young adults" or not, with all the consequences, as the roles are set from very young age.
I know parents who are horrified when they hear about 5 years old children cleaning up after themselves; with their model though, they set the role of "incapable children" and "providing parents" - "teaching" them to do the "chores" later will be hard, because it's not in the role they've taught.
I also disagree with the term "chore". It's true that they're boring, but this term disconnects tasks from their purposes; if nobody, say, sets and clears the table, nobody can eat. It's crucial to have in mind that chores/tasks always have a purpose. If a child is grown up as "incapable", there's no connection between task and purpose, and actually, it's rational to refuse to perform any task ("chore"), because it's part of somebody else's responsibilities (the "providing parent").
[+] [-] agumonkey|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] shigi42|4 years ago|reply
Can anybody recommend a good article or a book by a psychologist/psychiatrist elaborating this topic?
[+] [-] unknown|4 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] slothtrop|4 years ago|reply
On the other hand, I don't think I would have a hefty list of expectations. You're only a child once. My labor expectations are low, I just want them to have constructive / creative go-to activities when playing. Overscheduling or putting them to work all the time just robs them of childhood experience that they'll never get again. Putting away toys and cleaning up after a mess is a reasonable ask, as they need to learn to take care of themselves and not live like slobs into adulthood.
[+] [-] virtualritz|4 years ago|reply
Is that a thing in the US? My current dishwasher is from 2015, stock standard Ikea.
I never had to rinse anything for it to come out sparkling clean. Even in the fast program that only runs 64mins.
The other day I had an Airbnb guest from NYC and I saw him rinsing. And when asked why he told me that was necessary because the dishwasher couldn't cope with it otherwise and stuff would come out dirty.
He looked perplexed when I told him no dishwasher I used for over twenty years required rinsing beforehand.
Is this 'rinsing requirement' an urban myth sticking around in some areas of the world?
Edit: I live in Berlin but have been living in Australia, the UK, Japan and Italy over the last two decades. No dishwashers in the apartments I lived in in those countries required rinsing either.
[+] [-] bhdy55|4 years ago|reply
I wonder if some of the disagreement over this is because food becomes more stuck on the longer one leaves it, and so rinsing is needed if you are not going to start the dishwasher for another 12-18 hours?
[+] [-] bentcorner|4 years ago|reply
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_rBO8neWw04&t=0s
Dishwasher pods are heavily marketed in the US and actually wash more poorly compared to plain powder. With pods the pre-wash ends up running without detergent, so rinsing off dishes becomes necessary.
[+] [-] Belphemur|4 years ago|reply
Because of the quality of the water heater and the time it take for hot water to reach the dishwasher you have inconsistent washing.
Also most US brand of dishwasher rely on plastic components so I'm pretty sure they can't heat as well as full aluminium one.
[+] [-] xboxnolifes|4 years ago|reply
For the most part (ignoring old/damaged washers) it's just a holdover from the older generation. My parents and their parents did it, and I expect many of my cohort follow through by example. However, I do not rinse and the results come out the same.
The only caveat being that you will still get dirty spots if you over fill or place poorly certain shaped things. This happens regardless of rinsing, and I believe contributes to the myth
[+] [-] culopatin|4 years ago|reply
It doesn’t have a removable filter, just some sort of grille in the back that I have to clean between loads and the shitty texture makes it grip crap like Velcro, not fun.
[+] [-] thrower123|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Iv|4 years ago|reply
Ok, I'll give you the Maya method, or the French method, or the Japanese method, or the Hacker method, or wherever we figured out parenting from in our household:
make kids feel they are part of the adults group. Share tasks, concerns, information, understanding. My 7 yo is (clumsily) washing his dishes because the rule is that if you don't cook, you wash dishes. That before going back to play, we clean the table. It is the rule for everyone, adults or kids.
We don't fake enjoyment of the chores, we explain its usefulness, we (well, I) do complain a lot about them, and my kid sometimes does it too, but still does it without being told.
Kids learn by imitation and they want to belong to your group. Give them what they want there. Set the example, be fair, be honest.
[+] [-] kaitai|4 years ago|reply
It contrasts with a different point of view, that kids are just people, and people need to 1) take part in chores and work to make life function, and 2) sometimes feel bad because life is hard (either feel bad because they messed up, or because something happened to someone else). Chores can be fun, chores can be a drag, attitude matters -- but in the end food needs to be cooked and dishes need to be cleaned, no way around that. I think our culture in the US tries to avoid these realities and wants children to live a dream. From my point of view, though, it is a gesture of respect to include my child in the important work of running a house. Moreover, this child will be better-prepared for life if they can prepare food, manage a budget, fix clothing and mechanical problems, build some basic items, etc. I met too many folks in college who couldn't cook rice or wash their own laundry. That is not a setup for success. You can have a lot more fun if you can make a fancy ramen dinner and have your friends over to your crappy apartment that is decently furnished because you can manage curtains and bookshelves than if you need to pay $$ for all of the above. I have as much book learning as a person in the US can expect to have, but I really respect the lessons I learned from my elders about cooking, cleaning, preparing items from nature/fabric/wood, fixing stuff. Those lessons came from childhood involvement in chores. They carried over quite well to an engineering school education and then into the corporate world (see "tech debt").
My kid spent the weekend playing, learning how to change tires on the car, mixing pizza dough and getting toppings together, cleaning the living room, watching Disney music videos (no no no), and planting seeds for our seed starting. Just do stuff as part of life and include the kid to the extent they can participate.
[+] [-] gilbetron|4 years ago|reply
Seriously? I can get some simple joy from doing some chores, but most of them I'd happily give up. Kids aren't dumb, they figure things out real quick. They are also wired like their parents, and so if the parents like to do dishes and vacuum, the kids are likely to enjoy the same. I hate, and have always hated, mowing the lawn. I've done it for the vast majority of my life. Try to engage my son all you want, and he'll still hate it. Some people love mowing the lawn, I wish I was one of them!
Parenting is tough - read articles like these, try the techniques out, but don't feel bad if it doesn't work out. 99% of this content has been useless to me, but I do find 1% that helps. Just don't beat yourself up over it if it doesn't work.
[+] [-] langsoul-com|4 years ago|reply
Instead it added shit tons of rambling about the Maya method and I got no clue what it is...
[+] [-] thriftwy|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] vasco|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Tade0|4 years ago|reply
Most of the conflicts I had with my SO regarding chores were about the way things should be done not if.
Also it helps to assign responsibility - I have a friend who went as far as starting a family JIRA instance(it's frer for teams of up to 10). It's likely that it saved his marriage.
[+] [-] csw-001|4 years ago|reply
Here’s the thing - in that process we found fundamental disagreements on what’s important to clean up in the first place. Life’s too short to make beds… Rooms have doors for a reason… listing out what we each expected really helped launch a conversation about compromise about doing things at all, as much as it did who would do things. I’m a lot cleaner now because I know exactly what she wants, and she’s a lot more flexible and accepting of my messes because she knows it’s not my default and I’m trying for her.
[+] [-] ordu|4 years ago|reply
From ethics standpoint it is an arguable approach, so you need to think before choosing this path. I believe that something can be done about people not noticing the training, if you manage to frame this training in a manner that doesn't reject their illusion of a free will. But I'm not sure, because never tried. Though when you openly thank people for their help, it is a kind of reinforcement, and therefore conditioning. But it works worse then when reinforcement sneaks in without consciousness noticing it.
[+] [-] imgabe|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] amelius|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mamcx|4 years ago|reply
The "day off" (days off if wanna doit in blocks) is the reward!
[+] [-] hackernewds|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] gkhartman|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kqr|4 years ago|reply
First of all, it kills intrinsic motivation. Once you start to reward someone materially for behaviour, you have to continue in perpetuity because they no longer see any reason to do the thing "for its own reward", as we say.
Second, you replace an imperative (one washes one's dishes) with a business transaction (is the proposed payout really superior to the opportunity loss of my time?)
Third, you introduce odd incentives to optimise and find loopholes that allow you to get away with as little as possible for as much as possible.
It simply becomes a very different game. It seems like that worked out for you, which is great, but I'd be very careful about doing it with my children.
[+] [-] spoonjim|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nicoburns|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] kayodelycaon|4 years ago|reply
(ADHD throws a wrench into a lot of things.)
[+] [-] mensetmanusman|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] INTPenis|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] manmal|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] furtive808|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pwdisswordfish9|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] dang|4 years ago|reply
How to Get Kids to Do Chores: Does the Maya Method Work? - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17905657 - Sept 2018 (161 comments)
How Children in a Maya Village Do Chores - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17280710 - June 2018 (202 comments)
Also:
Tying Allowance to Chores Could Kill Kids’ Motivation to Help Out - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18779745 - Dec 2018 (114 comments)
Others?
[+] [-] sudhirj|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] shannifin|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] gregwebs|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] mostertoaster|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] GavinMcG|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lotophage|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] watwut|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pdpi|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] civilized|4 years ago|reply
[+] [-] hackernewds|4 years ago|reply