Concern #1 Clean Up Time in the Play Room

As many of you have shared, it is almost impossible for some of us to get our own one or two children to clean up after themselves at home. So how are we going to be expected to get a group of fifteen 3-5 year olds to clean up after themselves within a ten-minute time frame after playtime in the play room? First and foremost, I want to assure you that this is indeed possible to accomplish after spending three years watching our wonderful preschool teachers make this happen year after year. The Love and Logic Approach, combined with a few other "modeling" tricks, really help turn these preschoolers into responsible contributing members of our community when it comes to clean-up time. Here are some tips that work:

1.) Increase a sense of ownership of the task at hand in the children--make it THEIR problem/issue to be resolved that their playroom is messy and needs to be cleaned up if they want to join the teacher and parent volunteers at snack time.

Ways to increase ownership of the task:

--Assign two students to go to their peer group and pass on the message “We have two minutes until clean up time”. Hearing the message from their peers instead of an authority figure makes the students feel like it is a group project that is part of their day. It also instills a sense of ownership in the two students that are relating the message to their peers and they tend to “make sure” everyone is cleaning up when it is time to clean up.

--Encourage groups of students to be responsible for different sections of the room so that there is an increased sense of knowing what they need to finish before everyone heads downstairs for snack. When there is a smaller group cleaning up a section it is harder for a student to go unnoticed if they are not doing anything to help out. It increases accountability.

2.) Model a positive attitude towards cleaning up: Teacher and parent volunteers should model a positive attitude towards cleaning up and have fun with the children while they do it alongside them versus barking orders at them that it is a chore that must be completed no matter how boring it is.

--Saying comments like “I’m so happy that we always know where to find our toys, we always do such a great job cleaning them up and making sure they don’t get lost that way”.  “Isn’t fun to do a good job with our friends?”

3.) Present preschool students with choices and consequences in relation to the task at hand

--Present choices in an affirmative way without using the word “no”. Also, use thinking words when presenting clean up time: “You are welcome to join us for snack while Teacher Marcia reads a book out loud after you clean up. Which part of the room do you think needs the most helpers with clean up time today? What book do you think Teacher Marcia will read for us today?”

--When presenting a consequence:

” I understand that you don’t want to help our group of friends clean up right now, we will be sad that you won’t be with us when we are eating our yummy food and listening to Teacher Marcia’s funny story, but don’t worry we’ll make sure that you have a big lunch if you can’t make it to snack time.” (Make sure that there is an adult in the playroom to stay behind with students that do not clean up until they decide they will help clean up and go downstairs for snack—never leave the children unsupervised).

4.) Apply consequences in an unprotective yet uncritical way if they refuse to clean up.

Make sure that the uncooperative student stays in the playroom until they have helped clean something up. Do not let them convince you to let them go downstairs to eat a snack if they have not clean something up. (They eat lunch an hour later—so the suffering isn’t extreme).

--If they complain that they are hungry say—“I’m hungry too. Here, let’s both clean this part of the room up so that we can go down and eat before everyone puts the snacks away”. You are unprotective in that you don’t let them convince you to go downstairs to enjoy the story and food without doing the share of the work.

-- Be uncritical if the students decides not to clean up because you CANNOT lecture them about how they should clean up after themselves. When you lecture them, they can focus the anger on you for why they are not being allowed to go to snack time. When you don’t lecture them and instead commiserate with them about how hungry they are and how the problem might be solved, then the focus is back on them and their responsibility to make a good choice for themselves.

Good luck applying these strategies next week!