A Proactive Family, the Dream: Tips and Tools to Make it Happen
05 February, 2019
It's Saturday morning, I'm busy vacuuming up toast crumbs and cereal off the floor after the breakfast "storm" and I kindly ask my oldest to pick up and put away the three wooden blocks lying on the floor, just to make my job easier. Without looking up from his "Explorers" magazine, he replies: "I didn't use them!" A surge of frustration then washes over me. I turn off the vacuum cleaner and, much less kindly, I give him my perennial remark: "I'm not the one who ate cereal and left half of it on the floor, yet I'm the one vacuuming. I'm not the one who stains your clothes, yet I'm the one who stain-treats them every night," and so on! When I repeat the same thing for the hundredth time, I feel ridiculous and it infuriates me! So, with a lot of vigor, I continued to vacuum (you know, that vigor with which exasperated parents start cleaning!). I still took this time to reflect on what I could do to improve the situation and especially reduce this tendency toward "every man for himself" which is starting to take up a little too much space in this house.
First step: a family meeting*
Once the vacuum was put away, I called the whole family together for an EXTRAORDINARY meeting! When I feel like yelling at my children like that, it means there's something bothering me in this house, and I won't wait to become a "mom at the end of her rope" to fix it. We're going to talk about it all together and get into solution mode. To illustrate my point, I tell them about my experience at St-Hubert BBQ (feel free to use this anecdote if you want to make your children believe you worked there, because this story turned out to be very easy for the children to understand!). When I worked at St-Hubert, there was a very important rule that we all had to respect under penalty of dismissal: "Never walk around empty-handed!" If all your customers are eating, and you have no one to serve or clear, go around your colleagues' tables. It was together that we were productive, not each for himself.
The problem here is that parents adopt this attitude, but children are more likely to say, "I wasn't the last one to use it!" When parents do all the work, it's exhausting and it's not fair (to use my children's words!). When parents are exhausted, they are less inclined to do little extras because simply managing the daily minimum is already a very big task. I then gave them some examples: "In the morning, if I have to remind you to do your routine or to put away all the little things you don't put away, I'll probably just do the bare minimum for breakfast. On the other hand, if everyone does something (emptying the dishwasher, picking up a hand towel that fell in the bathroom, putting away a toy lying in the middle of the room instead of stepping over it, making their lunch, etc.), maybe I'll have more energy to make you pancakes or a good smoothie that requires more preparation..." (I must say I knew that by talking about a smoothie or pancakes for breakfast, I'd get a reaction!) We call that being PROACTIVE! So I proposed this to them: "For a limited time, if I observe you being proactive, I'll give you a token! What do you say?" Everyone voted for it and we decided to put this plan into action!
Second step: implementing the solution
So I prepared a little tip as a reminder so they could keep in mind what it means to be proactive. Here it is: My oldest got fully involved in "proaction." It must be said that he already has a predisposition for it. What's wonderful about the General Store system is that when one of the group makes an effort, the others feel obliged to do the same since everyone wants to have an equal number of tokens to spend in the Store when it's time to get rewards.
Results
If you're wondering if we solved the problem, the answer is no! But we greatly improved things. It all depends on the time we dedicate to it. It's clear that it required a lot of observation in the first few days. "Bravo Louis, I saw you put away the puzzle piece found on the rug, give yourself a token" or "Great Simone, I notice you really tried hard to make your bed, you did your best I can see it, you can put a block." With a lot of patience, we will succeed in helping these little beings we love so much grow and become responsible!
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