Some parents threaten to actually throw away the things they find
that are not put away. There are two problems with this notion. First,
if you do throw away some of your children’s possessions, that’s
pretty harsh (but parents have done it!). After all, they’re just kids and
don’t have an inherent desire to pick up after themselves. Second, it’s
likely you won’t really throw the stuff away. You’ll just go blustering
around about that possibility and how unfair your life is. In this case,
you are simply making a useless, empty threat, and the kids will catch
on to you right away.
Quik TipYour kids do not have a right to mess up your entire house! Tell the children that
by a certain time every day, anything of theirs that you find lying around will be
confiscated and unavailable to them until a certain time the following day. Pick up
the kids’ things without grumbling or lecturing. You’ll soon find that before the
magic hour comes each day, they will be scurrying around to salvage their
possessions.So imagine you’re using the garbage bag routine and have picked
8:00 p.m. as the cutoff time. At 7:50 p.m. you remind seven-year-old
Caitlin that her things need to be picked up. She doesn’t respond
because she doesn’t really think you’ll do anything about it. At 8:05
p.m., however, when you quietly begin walking around with a large
plastic bag and have already claimed five of her prized possessions,
Caitlin becomes a believer. She runs around frantically grabbing
whatever of hers she can find before you get to it and yelling, “This is