{Toddler Chores for Little Helpers}

Toddler Chores for Little Helpers:

Household Jobs Your Toddler Can Help With

 

Toddlers love to help out around the house, have you noticed? While their 'help' isn't always quite that, there are lots of household tasks that toddlers can do that are, at least, not unhelpful ;-) And doing 'big person jobs' always gives them such a sense of pride and boost of confidence! As Sweet Pea often says, 'I a Big Girl now!'

We're making a 'chores' system around our house for the girls. (I'm using the word 'chores' very loosely! Obviously, I'm not enforcing Cinderella practices around our home!) Princess Pea (aged 5) is certainly at an age when she can and should have some responsibilities at home. Aside from teaching her a sense of responsibility, having 'jobs' teaches her practical life skills, gross and fine motor skills, problem-solving and pre-mathematical skills, and - perhaps most importantly - reminds her that she is part of a family whose members help each other out. Having responsibilities around the house teaches her that it's important not only to do things for herself, but to do things for the 'greater good' of the family as a whole. 

I'll be writing more about our chore system and the jobs that she has in another post. But, of course, everything that big sister is doing, little sister wants to do, too. So I've been trying to come up with ideas of 'jobs' that 2 year old Sweet Pea can do - preferably ones that don't end up just making more work for me, as toddler 'help' is prone to do!

Thinking back to when Princess Pea was her age, here are some of the things she liked to help out with around the house that were actually helpful to some extent. 

Stirring the pancake batter

Stirring anything is always fun for toddlers and preschoolers - let them help with select food preparation that involves stirring (of course, use common sense regarding which items are suitable for your toddler to help stir - you may not want them stirring anything hot; raw eggs, etc.). 'Stirring' the knob on the salad spinner [affiliate link] is another favourite kitchen job in our house.

Picking the cherries from the garden tree

Toddlers love to pick things in the garden - anything from fruit, to vegetables, to herbs, to weeds -- you just have to show them which ones they can pick, and which ones they can't. They also love watering - consider making them one of these DIY watering cans to help them avoid drowning your flowers, or get them a cute kid watering can [affiliate link] of their very own.

Sweeping the balcony

Sweeping, vacuuming, dusting - any kind of cleaning that doesn't involve cleaning products can be done by a toddler. Ok, so you'll almost certainly still have to do it again yourself afterwards, but at least they're probably not creating more dirt while helping - and it keeps them occupied alongside you while you work.

Sorting the laundry

Toddlers can actually be quite helpful with the laundry. Matching socks, sorting clean laundry into piles according to who it belongs to, handing you items to hang, passing clothes pegs [affiliate link] - my two love all kinds of laundry tasks (they even engage in imaginary laundry play)! And it's one of the most educational 'chores' they can have, what with all the sorting and categorizing, and colours to discuss, etc. Matching and lining up shoes is another great clothes-related toddler job.

And, of course, there's always 'invented tasks'. These can come in handy when you don't really want them to help, but they're insisting. I must admit, I'm not above making up 'really important jobs' now and then, like "Here, you stir the cup of water and I'll stir the cup of coffee". Sometimes it's just easier to let them help with a fake job.

*One tip - As much as toddlers love to help with grown-up tasks, I've found that's it's never a good idea to inadvertantly tell a toddler that you *need* them to help with something. True to their toddler sensibilities, this always seems to be a surefire way to garner a negative response!

*Finally, I think this is obvious, but just in case - toddlers and preschoolers should always be supervised in any activity!

What sorts of tasks do your toddlers like to 'help' with?

The Happy Housewife has a great printable list of age-appropriate household 'chores' that kids of all ages can help out with.

Looking for tasks a preschooler can do? Check out this list of 10 household jobs suitable for preschoolers from Housekeeping.org. 

You can find more suggestions for letting your toddler 'help' at home (with a bit of humour - which you'll need if you are letting your toddler do housework!) at Glittering Muffins: 12 Ways to Include Your Toddler in Everyday House Work.

And check all the fun ways that Jamie at Hands On: As We Grow has her son 'help' at home!

If this is your first time visiting Mama Pea Pod - welcome! Please use the buttons and labels on the right and below to take a look around, and I'd love for you to come join us over on the Mama Pea Pod Facebook community. There you'll find lots more parenting, kids' craft, and play ideas shared daily. If you like what you see here, please consider subscribing to receive weekly email updates on new posts.

You might also want to check out some of my other popular parenting posts:
5 Tips for Telling Your Preschooler How Babies Are Made
Picky Eaters: Tips to Encourage Your Child to Try Different Foods
Our Chore System: Learning About Responsibility at Home
Creative 'Toys' for Kids

{Outdoor Play Party: DIY Watering Can}

Make Your Own Watering Can

and 

Water the Garden

Children just love to help water the garden, and my two little peas are no exception. Unfortunately, it can sometimes mean overwatering for the plants, as they tend to pour too much water from the watering can. So we made this DIY watering can for them to use to sprinkle the flowers with water. 

We got an empty plastic bottle, a nail, and a hammer. I had hoped that Princess Pea would be able to do the hammering herself, but it proved too difficult for her. In the end, she showed me where to put the holes and I did the hammering. We made about 5 holes. Put them near the top end of the bottle, so you can fill it up while upright. Then turn it over and sprinkle the water on the garden!

They think it's great fun to use, and I'm pretty sure the flowers like it, too, since it means they don't get a whole watering can of water dumped on them by overeager little hands.


In the last Outdoor Play Party, we had a record 53 ways to play outdoors linked up! Thank you to everyone who shared; what a great resource we are creating together! I absolutely loved this 'kid wash' carwash system made by Familylicious! I would love to have this set up in my garden! I'd definitely be going through it myself!

Seriously, how fun does that look?!

{Imaginary Play Fairy Garden - Outdoor Play Party}

Making a Fairy Garden

for Imaginary Play

This week we made a fairy garden outdoors. We had an indoor fairyland in the winter, but now that summer is on the way and we are playing outdoors pretty much all day long these days, we wanted to have an outdoor set-up for imaginary play with our fairies.

So we got a big, plastic flowerpot (on casters for easy movability), and filled it with potting soil. I wanted to make it with soil so they could have the sensory experience of playing in the 'dirt', and because Sweet Pea loves to dig around and grab handfuls of soil from our other potted flowers that we don't necessarily want dug up! At least this one she's allowed to play with.

We planted some real flowers that Princess Pea picked out at the gardening shop, and we had a plastic castle from our sandbox that we put in. They don't show up well in the pictures, but we made some butterflies on stakes by glueing pre-cut foam butterfly shapes on each side of a craft stick (much like how we made our heart toothpick toppers).

We also made fake play flowers out of cut-up slices of pool noodles with pipe-cleaners stuck into the bottoms of them. And we added some corks for stepping stones/seats, some mushrooms (they're on wires for flower arrangements), and some figures - fairies, a dragon, and a frog.

Finally, I found some cute garden stakes with chalkboard sides that the girls used to write welcome notes to entice the fairies to come and live there!

And the best part is that all the pieces except the real flowers are moveable, so they can create and recreate their fairy world as much as they like!

On to the Outdoor Play Party!

Did you see this post among the 42 ideas for outdoor play linked up last time? 

15 Ways for Outdoor Play for Baby, Toddler, Child shared by Angelique Felix.

This and more great 'springy' ideas can be found at this Spring Carnival!

{The Carrot Seed - A Seed for Learning}

The Carrot Seed

A Seed for Learning

Princess Pea will soon be five (yikes!), and has been talking a lot about starting school (though she won't start until she's 6). So I've been bringing home books from school that go together as a theme that we can talk and learn about. We've been calling it 'school' - she loves to have 'school time' - it makes her feel like such a big kid! This is protected time for just her and me - Daddy Pea takes Sweet Pea to do something else, so we can have this time alone together. 

We've been having beautiful, summery weather lately, so Princess Pea and I have been making a habit a couple of times a week to sit in the garden and read and talk together after I get home from work. 

This week, we read about how plants grow.

We started by reading The Carrot Seed by Ruth Krauss [affiliate link]. (Thanks to Kristina at Toddler Approved for this Virtual Kids Book Club suggestion!)

Princess Pea was very interested in why the carrot isn't visible on the plant when it finally grows. We talked a lot about the parts of a plant - roots, stems, leaves, flowers, seeds - and how we can eat the different parts: carrots are roots, lettuces are leaves, peas are seeds, etc. We consulted a non-fiction book, The Seed by Christine Young [affiliate link], to see how the different parts of the plant grow and the life cycle of a plant. 

Then we reread a current fiction favourite, The Pea Blossom by Amy Lowry Poole [affiliate link], which tells the sweet story of a pea from the time it is in its pod to when it grows into a plant with pods and peas of its own, and how it inspires a sick little girl to get better.

Then we read another non-fiction book, Carrots by Gail Saunders-Smith [affiliate link]. In it, we see all the steps involved in how the carrot goes from seed to carrot to dinner. Princess Pea loves to help make dinner and after reading the book she really wanted to help cook some carrots for dinner. Unfortunately, we were out of carrots. So we had a cucumber instead. I taught her how to peel it by herself and she was so excited to be really helping!

Afterwards, we talked about who else likes to eat carrots - bunnies, of course! And we went on a bunny hunt in the garden! I had some bunny cut-outs left over from our Easter Egg Hunt party, so I hid them in the garden and she had to find them - all while hopping like a bunny! (I didn't realize it at the time, but this activity totally reminds me of the rabbit-themed Garden Hunt that Abbie from Greening Sam and Avery guest posted here on Mama Pea Pod last summer.)

Then we had a little treat - a marzipan carrot that the Easter Bunny had left!

Finally, I got her to pick the dandelions from the garden (a great way to do the weeding!) - which she used to form a letter C for carrot!

Want to join the Virtual Kids' Book Club, too?

{Making Our Mark in the Garden}

Well, we finally moved to our new house! Yay!!!

One of the things we're most excited about is having our very own garden to do with as we please.

So one of the first things we did this week after moving in was to make our marks in the garden!

We each picked a rock from the many that surround the house and marked them as our own.

Princess Pea, Daddy, and I used permanent markers to write our names on the fronts and the date on the back. Sweet Pea picked several rocks and, since I wasn't ready to put a permanent marker into her hands just yet, used the window crayons to scribble her own marks on them.

Drawing on rocks in the garden

Then we put them back into the garden to find on another day.

How many can you spot?

Sharing at: Link 'n' Learn and The Kids' Co-Op, TGIF

{Our Week Outdoors: April 8-14}

 

A Day at Great-Grandma Pea's Cottage:

Dancing and tramping about in Great-Grandma Pea's spring garden.

Watching the kite-surfers.

Taking a walk around the neighbourhood....

And running as fast as we can down the hill!

Getting Outside At Home:

Repotting the seedlings we planted a few weeks ago.

A Day Visiting Great-Grandma's Childhood Village:

 

 Helping with the gardening at the cementary.

A Day at the Zoo:

 Almost falling asleep on the swinging basket at the playground.

Hide and seek.

Taking in the sights.

Getting silly!

This post is linked up at We Play, It's Playtime, and The Play Academy. Check out the other great play ideas there!

{Planting Seeds}

Spring has arrived here at last! This week we did some seed planting. Princess Pea had been saving seeds from various fruits and explorations in the playground, so now that the weather has warmed up a bit, we were able to get outside and plant them. First I helped her to set up some beans (kidney beans and black beans from the kitchen cupboard) to sprout in jars with wet paper towels. Then we went out to the balcony where she did all the seed planting all by herself. She had apple seeds, squash seeds, a peach pit, a chestnut, and some mystery nuts she found in the playground at preschool. Don't know if any of them will actually grow, but we'll see!

And then she bid them all ,"Goodnight little seeds! See you when you wake up!"