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green cleaning
By FRANK ROBERTSON 2,961 views
LIFESTYLE

How to Engage Your Children with Green Cleaning?

Being a part of a family means being a part of a union. And in every union, each member should contribute something. Even though kids are the youngest members of a family, when they reach a certain age, they can also help out around the house. Parents have too many things and obligations on their minds. And having kids help out with some simple household chores does make things easier a bit. However, some parents don’t give their children any household chores to do, as they require using certain products with harmful ingredients. This is something you can overcome easily, by switching to using eco-friendly cleaning products.

Kids can do simple tasks such as taking out the garbage, emptying the dishwasher, mopping floors, or something similar. This teaches them responsibility and raises their ecological awareness at the same time. What you need to do to engage your children with green cleaning is to get appropriate tools, for starters. You can and should make cleaning fun and competitive. To motivate your kids to do their best you can hand out some small rewards. Cleaning together as a family also counts as family time, remember that! The following simple tips will help you create a peaceful and positive home environment.

Get Appropriate Tools

When introducing kids to cleaning and household chores, you should start with getting the appropriate tools and supplies. Kids are small, they have small hands and they can’t hold very heavy things, so you should have these things in mind when purchasing tools. Any equipment they use should be lightweight, the right size, and not dangerous to use. Also, any product they need to use for cleaning shouldn’t be poisonous or toxic. You can get some sweepers and mops with extendable handles, so both you and the kids can work with them with ease. You can start with some simple tasks such as making their bed and keeping their room organized. Remember to show them how and explain when they should do it. After they have mastered those, you can move on to some more serious ones, such as taking out the garbage, unloading the dishwasher, and mopping floors.

Make cleaning fun

Cleaning the house doesn’t have the be a tedious and dreaded job. You can make it fun in numerous ways. Everything is more fun if you make it seem like a game. The point is to make children feel good about doing some chores. So, you can play some music while cleaning. If your children are older, you can take chores out of a chore hat. If you act like you’re excited about doing the chores and relaxing afterward, so will the kids.

They look up to you and copy everything you do. It’s essential to set an example. Every now and then, you can even hire professional eco-friendly cleaning services to deep clean your home. It saves you a lot of time and energy. In that way, you can have more free time to spend with your family doing something more rewarding. Green cleaning services are also available for professional and business purposes.

Use green products

When it comes to engaging kids with green cleaning, the single most important thing is to use green products. These products are made with natural ingredients only, so they are not harmful to kids or adults generally. And they still do the job well. There are certain ingredients you should avoid in products. These include ammonia, chloride, terpenes, phenols, chlorine, and others. Always read the label of a product you intend to buy. By using such products, you’ll raise your children’s ecological awareness, which is what our planet desperately needs. So, engaging your kids in green cleaning has, in fact, benefits on a global level.

 Organize competitions

Making your cleaning chores a competition can help in motivating children to be even excited about completing chores. You can also use a timer and keep score. Set a timer and see who can pick up toys faster. You can organize a competition for almost any household chore. Just make sure that it is both well done and completed quickly. It isn’t valid if it’s done superficially.

Hand out rewards

Speaking about competitions, you kids can be even more motivated for cleaning if there is some reward after finishing everything. The reward can be anything essentially. It doesn’t have to be something huge. It can be something simple such as some candy, cake, watching TV or playing in the park. When children do an exceptional cleaning job, make sure to praise them and show your appreciation, it will mean a lot to them. This is the ideal period in their life to install these habits. If you don’t do it while they’re young, the chances are that you won’t be able to do it later.

 Clean together

Engaging in cleaning together counts as family time. It’s so much easier to do everything together. Somehow time passes by quickly. When one person needs to do everything, that can take a while and it’s bound to be exhausting. In this way, when you do household chores together as a family, you can accomplish them much more quickly. And then you have more time for doing fun things together such as visiting an amusement park, taking a walk, going for a swim or something similar. And nobody’s tired too much!

DIY recipes

Besides tones of organic and natural cleaning products available, you can also make your own, with ingredients you probably have in your home. You can make an all-purpose cleaning product by mixing 1 part vinegar and 1 part water in a spraying bottle. You can use this mixture for counters and toilets, however, not on marble. When doing the laundry, you can add half a cup of vinegar during the rinse cycle to soften the clothes and remove odors. For polishing wood surfaces you can use 2 parts lemon juice and 1 part olive oil. Put it on a rag and polish anything wooden.

Cleaning is a part of our everyday life, so we should teach our kids that, too. Living green and in an eco-friendly way is essential not only for our personal health but for the whole planet as well. The future depends on it.