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Chores by Age – with printable
Chores are important for the development of our children. They help to teach responsibility, perseverance, unity in the family, and readiness for adulthood. Chores also help to decrease issues of entitlement.
All good things!
At the same time, it is important that we are understanding the developmental abilities for our children. Otherwise we are setting them up to unnecessarily fail.
That only leads to frustration for you and your children.
Below you will find developmental abilities and chores by age. The lists progress off of each other and are meant only as a guide. These developmental abilities are not hard and fast rules as some kids are much more mature in their abilities whereas other children may be slightly behind.
18 month – 2 yr old Developmental Ability
Your toddler at this stage likes to be social (even if that’s only with familiar people). They enjoy handing things to others and can recognize simple objects. As you have experienced, they are exploring greater independence but also like to imitate others. At this age, your toddler can follow one-step, maybe two-step, directions.
Chores
At this age, chores need to be simplistic. Your child will do best if they are modeled the behavior and helped. Praise is going to be your best friend in reinforcing the behaviors you want your child to learn and complete.
- Put away shoes
- Pick up toys (with assistance)
- Throw away food wrappers
- Put empty sippy cups/cups and plates in the sink to “clear the table”. (You likely will need to pick them up!)
3-4 yr old Developmental Ability
Your toddler at this stage is usually bursting with creativity and enjoys exploring new things. Their language is progressing by leaps and bounds and their coordination for fine motor tasks is getting more and more complex. There ability to control large body movements is more regulated. They are also able to follow 2 to 3-step directions and/or simplistic charts.
Chores
To create buy-in with your little one, use their enjoyment and desire for creativity to complete tasks. Your child still needs chores to be modeled and helped with. Chores can be slightly more complex.
- Learn to dress themselves
- Help make their bed
- Pick up clothes and put in the hamper
- Help you with laundry – separating clothes (great for learning colors), pouring detergent (with assistance), pressing buttons.
- Pick up toys and put in bins, baskets, closets
- Help feed and water the pets
- Taking their items from the vehicle to the house
- Help preparing food – getting items for you from the fridge, stirring items (with support and supervision)
- Yard work – help pick up sticks
5-7 yr old Developmental Ability
While your child will still benefit from modeled behavior, your ability to give them a task and then walk away is much increased during this time. Your child now has greater ability to follow chore charts as well as 3 to 4-step tasks. Even so, it is important that you are not expecting perfection but still are viewing the chores as a learning process.
We use this chart!
Chores
This is a great age to implement “check backs” where once your child is finished with the chore they have to let you know so you can check.
- Dress independently
- Complete daily hygiene tasks – brush teeth, comb hair, wash body, (Girls may still need help washing/combing hair depending upon length)
- Make bed
- Sort laundry by themselves
- Set the table
- Clear the table
- Load/unload the dishwasher with assistance
- Help to prepare the food – stirring, chopping (with assistance!)
- Picking up toys
- Cleaning their room
- Help fold clothes
- Help dust
- Vacuum
- Yard work – help shovel snow, rake leaves, and sweep sidewalks
8-11 year old Developmental Abilities
Your child at this age has a better ability to follow multiple verbal steps due to increased cognitive processing development. At the same time, they are likely going to need reminders on your perception of “clean” verses theirs! The concept of cause and effect is also more developed. Which means the use of natural consequences is important for continued growth and understanding.
Chores
- All hygiene tasks independently
- Keep their room clean
- Be responsible for personal items
- Be responsible for homework assignments (still a good idea to check!)
- Wash dishes
- Load and unload the dishwasher
- Take out the trash/recycling
- Help wash the vehicles
- Sweep
- Learn how to use the laundry washer and dryer
- Make simplistic meals with supervision (spaghetti, mac n’ cheese etc.)
- Walk the dog and pick up dog poop
- Help clean the bathrooms
12-13 year old Developmental Abilities
The second go-around of questioning “why”. This age is starting to develop abstract reasoning. Meaning, the truths they once agreed with and believed may likely be questioned in greater depth. This can certainly be viewed as defiance (and sometimes is definitely is) but there is also a legitimate search for understanding to develop their identity. The use of rationales is important during the age range.
Chores
- Keep track of personal items and activity times
- Make more complex meals (some assistance may still be necessary)
- Mastery of dusting, sweeping, vacuuming
- Cleaning the bathroom without assistance
- Change bedding
- Mow the lawn
- Babysitting (check state laws to be sure!)
14-15 year old Developmental Abilities
Cause and effect, abstract reasoning, problem solving, and critical thinking are all in the works during this age range. By this age, all of the previous chores should be at or close to the mastery level. At this age, they should have greater awareness of the needs of the household and be able to participate in helping without needing to be told. This also can be an emotionally difficult age as they are on the cusp of greater freedom and responsibility but not quite!
Chores
- Mastery of all previous chores
- Help with meal planning
- Recognizing and completing housework and yard work before asked
- Engage in volunteer activities
16-18 year old Developmental Abilities
Cause and effect as well as abstract reasoning are mostly developed yet they still have a ways to go with critical thinking. (Your prefrontal cortex doesn’t fully finish forming until early to mid twenties!) But your late teen should be a significant source of support around the house. At this age, with looming career choices on the horizon, you may find greater questioning about identity, life, and societal issues.
Chores
- Capable of getting a part-time job
- Responsible for managing personal finances
- Able to buy their own clothes (outside of necessity)
- Taught how to be responsible for maintaining the vehicle they are driving (put in gas, fill washer fluid, check tire pressure, check oil, and jump the battery)
- Able to go grocery shopping for you when necessary
- Able to help with dropping off/picking up younger siblings from activities
Don’t forget to grab your printable of the above chore breakdown by age!
Proverbs 22:6 (NIV)
6 Start children off on the way they should go, and even when they are old they will not turn from it.
I pray that this post helps you to determine the right chores for your child to help them grow and develop into the person God created them to be!
God bless!
Melissa
I believe chores are very important in a child’s development but they must be age appropriate. I love the breakdown you did by age and what the child is capable of.
Thank you Tressie! I know chores can be a difficult area for parents and kids to navigate. My hope is that this can help some of the issues. Thank you for stopping by and sharing your thoughts. God bless!
So detailed, so amazing, so timely. I need to adopt my 9-year-old son’s bracket of chores and just get him doing all of them. And oops, was worried about my 20-year-old daughter. Thought she was still more of a baby but I get some kind of relief from this (Your prefrontal cortex doesn’t fully finish forming until early to mid-twenties!). Learnt quite a lot. Thank you for this detailed guide.
I’m glad that the post was beneficial for you Judith! I love when God leads us to information right when we need it. Thank you for stopping by and sharing your thoughts. God bless!
What a helpful list! I remember a friend saying she had someone tell her to have the mindset that your child isn’t an adult, so don’t treat them like one. Which sounds simple, but I’m sure it’s easy to get into the mindset of expecting too much from young children!
That’s such a hard balance because our role as parents is to help them become successful adults. So we need to meet them where they are, meaning not have too high of expectations, yet at the same time ensure we are guiding and teaching them the skills they need for later in life. So also not being too lax in expectations. “Parenting is easy”, said No One! Ever! Thank you for stopping by and sharing your thoughts. God bless!
I’m so relieved to see that my 9 year old is not out of the norm when he ‘cleans’ his room and there are still legos and shoes in the floor. Definitely will be discussing the different perceptions of clean!
Ha! Yes, the perceptions can be quite different. This is a continual reminder for my 8 year old as well. Thank you for stopping by and sharing your experiences. God bless!
Great list!! This is so helpful. I have to admit I went straight to my daughter’s age group to see if I was hitting the mark and I can say she does most of the items.
Ha! I’m glad you got some reassurance. There is always going to be some differentiation depending upon the development and maturity of the child. Thank you for stopping by. God bless!
These type of guidelines were so helpful to me when I had children in the home. I was harder on my oldest before I realized that my expectations of her were not quite age appropriate.
That does tend to be true of most oldest children. At the same time, I’m noticing an overarching trend of lack/reduced chores for most kids. Thank you for stopping by and sharing your experience. God bless!
I was just thinking about this the other day! Thank you for the breakdown. I find it hard to give them more independence and responsibility because I often think it will be a lot of work on the forefront to teach them how (which it is). But then when they are able to really pitch in and help, it certainly is rewarding. Thanks!
It is certainly easier to just do it ourselves, right?! But they really are missing out on awesome opportunities for growth and development. And getting the benefit of them pitching in is pretty nice! 😉 Thank you for stopping by! God bless!
What a great printable! Our problem isn’t that our kids won’t do chores, but they aren’t motivated to do them. I wish they’d do them without my asking or nagging. 😉
That’s a hard one! Hopefully in time with maturity and every developing character. Thanks for stopping by! God bless!
This was very helpful! My 13 year old complains about the chores I request of him and for a little bit I wondered if they were too hard or too much for his age but reading this showed me that I am right on track with his age and actually he is behind in some ways! This encouraged me to keep teaching him and encouraging him!
I’m glad you found the post encouraging! Sometimes it can be hard to know exactly where to place expectations. Thank you for stopping by and sharing your experiences. God bless!
Chores are so important, but being consistent about encouraging them to do their chores is just as important too. Sometimes it’s so difficult to allow the littles to take the time (so long) to do their chores instead of doing it for them, but the pay off is so great when they are responsible for them.
Very true Kristi! It used to take FOREVER for my kids to unload the dishwasher. It was a bit painful to watch. Now it’s a much faster ordeal and they’ve learned the skill. Thank you for stopping by and sharing your thoughts. God bless!
It’s amazing how my 10 and 11 year old can work a phone or iPad like a nuclear physicist but when it comes to washing the dishes they forget how the dish rag works and hold it up and look at it like they are just pull My am alien life form from a cave just discovered. This is so hard in my house. I hope you don’t mind but I’m going to tell them you are a world leading expert on chores and post your list by their beds so they know what is expected of them. Thanks for the great read
Prescott your comments always make me laugh! I’m not so sure about the world leading expert part but I have been a therapist working with kids and families for close to a decade. I’m glad you enjoyed the post. God bless!
This will be required reading for my 10- and 15-year-olds today!! They think they’re the ONLY kids with chores! Haha.
Thanks for the breakdown of abilities by age. We do that each year for our foreign adoption report, too—didn’t think about it as a rationale for helping out around the house. 🤔☺️
They won’t be too happy with me! I get that a lot in my therapy office 🙂 I’m glad that you found the post beneficial. Thank you for stopping by. God bless!
I love this! I don’t have any children yet as my husband and I recently got married so we are waiting a few years to get everything together, but as I know it’s truly up to God to decide. Definitely pinning this for later!
Congratulations on the wedding! Having some time together before kids start adding to the family is a blessing, too. God knows our timing better than us! Thank you for stopping by and pinning. God bless!