Friday, March 14, 2008

Inspection

I have implemented a new program in the Carter House. It is called inspection. I wasn't sure if it would work or not but so far, it has been great.

I have two daughters that don't think twice about dropping anything and everything they have on the floor of their room. They have 200 million stuffed animals, they have 100 million books, and 50 million crayons. In a matter of minutes their room can be so cluttered with stuff that you can not even see the floor. Then, every Saturday we go through the process of yelling and screaming at them to clean up their rooms. It really never gets clean. SO, last Saturday I held to my guns and made sure that EVERYTHING was picked up off of the floor. I mean everything. Not one animal, not one shirt, not one sock. Then, I told the girls that I would inspect their room every day.

First day, I found a few things on the floor during inspection and I found their drawers open and shoes left out. I pointed them out and the girls put the stuff away. The room was clean. The next day, less items were on the floor. Each day there have been less and less stuff on the floor. Tomorrow is Saturday and I think they are starting to see with a "small" amount of effort all week they will have a clean room the next Saturday.

The girls like it so much, they find me when I get home from work and ask for an inspection of their room. I have started to have fun with it and I am now requiring them to salute. :-)




The next disaster area I am hoping to clean up with my inspection tactics will be unleashed on the boys. I'll let you know how it goes.