Age Appropriate Laundry Chores for Kids

As a busy working mom, I sometimes feel like I am drowning in laundry! Kids of just about all ages can help with laundry, making this chore a little less daunting. If you are stumped with how your kids can help out with the laundry, try these age appropriate ideas. Just follow this guide for age appropriate laundry chores for kids of every age.

Toddlers and Preschoolers (Ages 2-5). How on earth can a toddler or preschooler help with laundry? In many ways! Not only can you get a little help (okay, so maybe the help here is somewhat in the form of just keeping your little one occupied), but you can teach your toddler or preschooler in the process. Toddlers and preschoolers can help with laundry by sorting piles of dirty laundry by color. This helps teach color matching. Toddlers and preschoolers can also working on matching by finding all of the clean socks in a load of laundry and trying to find the matches. Kids this age love helping out with the laundry so take advantage of this short-lived desire to contribute!

Lower Elementary (Ages 6-9). At these ages, kids can really start to be a major help with the laundry. First of all, kids this age can be responsible for taking their own laundry to the laundry room or placing it in a designated place (if you use a laundr-o-mat, for instance). Your kids will quickly find out that if they don't take their dirty clothes to the right location, they won't get cleaned! Having this as an established chore is a great way to get kids to help out with the laundry. Children this age can also help out with laundry by sorting and matching socks just like toddlers and preschoolers.

Tweens/Pre-teens (Ages 10-12). Kids this age can really be a wonderful help with laundry. Tweens are definitely old enough to put away their own clothes. You'll be surprised as a mom how much time you save when all you have to do is wash, dry, and fold the laundry! Just place stacks of clean laundry in your child's room (put them right on top of the bed so they have to be moved to use the bed) and have your child put the clothes in the right drawers, closet, etc. This chore is in addition to your tween children taking their clothing to the laundry room. Tweens can be a super help with the laundry when they put their own clothes away.

Teens (Ages 13-18). Okay so technically teens can do their own laundry from start to finish. But if you don't mind to still do laundry for your teen children, but do want their help, here are some great ways they can help out. Teens should be able to take their clothing to the laundry and place their clothing in the appropriate sorted piles. Teens can fold their own laundry and they can certainly put away their own laundry. Clothing is important to most teens so if they must do laundry chores to insure that their clothing is clean, they will participate.

Laundry can be an overwhelming task for busy moms! Try these age-appropriate tips to get your children involved in laundry chores so that the laundry doesn't take over your life.