How much responsibility to give children and how reliable?

[Chasingmytail]

For simple chores around the farm - half to hour a day

Just wondering for my 11 & 8yr old. Sadly its very erratic with moans and deviation. Thought they'd be more driven to helping. What I cant stand is the lying that they've done it when they haven't - thats not acceptable. Keep stating we are a family team.

Hardwork this parenting thing.

 

[nick...]

I was made to help as soon as i could walk and been at it ever since.i think today's children get mollycoddled far too much and they would rather lay in bed,play on computers and not do anything dirty or cold.my neighbor cant get his childeren to do anything at 15/20and 25.they dont want for anything but wont even cut the grass around the yard.
Nick...

 

[David.]

Sounds like he's made a rod for his own back then.

 

[nick...]

Sounds like he's made a rod for his own back then.

Yes they definalty have.
Nick...

 

[GTB]

For simple chores around the farm - half to hour a day

Just wondering for my 11 & 8yr old. Sadly its very erratic with moans and deviation. Thought they'd be more driven to helping. What I cant stand is the lying that they've done it when they haven't - thats not acceptable. Keep stating we are a family team.

Hardwork this parenting thing.

Every child needs to learn to do chores and take/obey orders from a young age. Sadly in this day and age some of them think they don't have to help. Very important that both parents are singing from the same hymn sheet. As soon as one parent undermines the other's authority it's game over I'm afraid. As for farm work, if they aren't interested they won't be much use, and there's no point flogging a dead horse i.e. if it's not in them it's best to encourage them to work off farm.

As for lying about doing a job. Our eldest used to do that and still would if he thought he could get away with it. I feel they insult our intelligence when they do that and it's not acceptable.

Please don't think I'm preaching, the above advice is what I've learnt and concluded from experience and hindsight. If I could turn the clock back twenty years a lot of things would get done very differently.

 

[nick...]

Some youngsters on farms dont want to help but still want the rewards
Nick...

 

[gatepost]

I can only speak for myself, we always got our 3 to help feed calves milk, get sheep in, but then they could sit in the truck read a book, nintendo or run off and explore, but not made to slog at it, just enjoy being part of the team, they have all had a few animals which were theirs, youngest just finishing agri collage, middle one, Flouriest/wing walker, they both have been lambing for others, now ours, oldest just taken a pub, in other words just because we are all mad about farming that might not be right for them, I've got a friend who is constantly at his kids, only young, haven't done this to his level or left that, one day they are going to escape. The only thing I used to say was we are all in this together and it put shoes on your feet so come and help. Good luck.

 

[Doing it for the kids]

No easy answer, every parent has their own views!

My eldest is not quite 2.5 yrs, says please and thank you, puts her coat / shoes / toys away mostly, sits on the mower with me and generally wants to help out.

If this carries on as she grows up, she can Soon help with basics like emptying bins, feeding the dogs and doing my accounts

Lying is the one thing that drives wife and I nuts, want to nip that in the bud if possible!

 

[Lazy Sod]

It was 60 years ago now, but my father did his best to put me off farming, although unintensionally. He didn't make silage then, as the winter diet for the, outwintered dairy cows, was based on hay and kale.
From the age of 11 or 12, I would help my father feed the cows on winter sunday mornings. We would take the tractor and trailer plus the hay, to the kale field and he would hitch on an old finger bar mower and cut 2 swaths of kale along one side of the field. We would the load one swath on to the trailer with pitchforks and move the electric fence over the other one, then let the cows in. The next job was to put the loaded hay and kale out for the night feed. Initially I drove the tractor and he forked the kale off. As I got older, I had to do the unloading. If it wasn't raining it was bitterly cold, and I hated it, although I enjoyed doing other tractor work, chain harrowing, rolling and cultivations, when spring came along.
It was only after I obtained the required O levels that I required for my other chosen career, at the age of 17 I changed my mind and stayed on the farm. By then silage was made and aweful kale business was forgotten. The early tractor driving stood me in good stead, and I drove the combine the same year that I left school. Other than normal pocket money, I didn't get paid until I was on the farm full time. I have never regretted staying at home.

 

[scatterbrainedlass]

Not there yet as mine is only 17 months but already carries the dog biscuits and puts them in the dog's bowls every day, helps tidy up his stuff and likes to come out and help with the sheep/carry buckets around. The only thing I can suggest is to work on a reward system. Until their chores are done they can't watch tv/play computer games, or even (depending on what time of day the work is to be done) tell them that they don't eat until the animals have been fed, so no tea until the work's done. Also maybe come up with some sort of punishments for lying, extra chores or a ban on technology??

 

[Bongodog]

Why do you think that your children should do chores round the farm ?
The washing up, putting out their dirty laundry, keeping their bedroom clean should all be on the list, but work round the farm should be entirely voluntary

 

[newbie]

Ooh, tricky one.
Can't really help much but I think we are all born different. Some love to help, others are just in it for themselves. I have 2 young boys and they couldn't be more different.
Perhaps give them chores but try and tailor them to what they are most interested in.
Also, perhaps try to avoid giving them jobs which are essential if you can't trust them just at the moment.
Sorry I can't really help, I agree, it's tough this parenting lark :- )

 

[GTB]

Why do you think that your children should do chores round the farm ?
The washing up, putting out their dirty laundry, keeping their bedroom clean should all be on the list, but work round the farm should be entirely voluntary

Totally disagree. Whilst it's important not to use your children as free slave labour it's equally as important that they learn that everyone has to muck in and help when needed. This will stand them in good stead whatever career they chose to follow. Indeed a local businessman would only employ farmers' sons or daughters because they had the correct work ethic.

 

[David.]

We never much punished the misdemeanour, only the lie that they tried to tell about it.

 

[DrWazzock]

I was hand hoeing beet from the age of seven. I think we got 10p a row and the rows were over 600 metres long. I had a group of cade lambs to feed from primary school days, before I went to school and after I came home. Also a coup of bantams. I did a bit of tractor driving and by 16 I was driving an old combine at harvest time. I wasn't really helped with this as the old folk were busy so has to get it going myself before I started. Looking back I probably made quite a mess. My Dad always got us involved with projects in the workshop but money and time was always tight so there wasn't much mollycoddling.

Any pocket money earned was a kind of secondary consideration really as we were made aware from an early age that our small farm business depended on us doing things right and pulling together. Seeing your Dad and uncle completely knackered also made you want to help. I remember my uncle sweating while hand building bales on the bale trailer while he was recovering from having had a heart attack. We were helping him because we didn't want him to have another heart attack more than anything and didn't want the farm to go under. Parents worries rubbed off on us.

Whether this did us any good I'm not sure, but I still have a sense that I can't rest until everything is up to date or I'm getting too tired to do the job properly.

My father was and still is a perfectionist which isn't easy to live with or really the best way sometimes with but it is slightly catching as well.

The way your parents work does rub off on you if you work with them from an early age.

I don't think it's just a case of saying here's £5 if you'll clean that tractor. You have to incentivise by giving them some sort of stake in the longer term outcome of a small part of the enterprise, rearing some stock for sale, doing up a piece of machinery that kind of thing.

Children should still have time to be children though. Looking back I maybe got too wrapped up in the farm too early. Dunno.

 

[beefandsleep]

Kids are like plants, they grow into the space (responsibility) they are given.

 

[Exfarmer]

I was made to help as soon as i could walk and been at it ever since.i think today's children get mollycoddled far too much and they would rather lay in bed,play on computers and not do anything dirty or cold.my neighbor cant get his childeren to do anything at 15/20and 25.they dont want for anything but wont even cut the grass around the yard.
Nick...

I have a neighbour with children much the same age and they probably work just as hard. Cannot believe that any sane man would allow their kids to not pull their weight.
At 11& 8 my brother and I were doing milking shifts putting 50+ cows through an old abreast on our own.
I was the younger one and stayed farming , it put my brother off I think.

 

[Bongodog]

Totally disagree. Whilst it's important not to use your children as free slave labour it's equally as important that they learn that everyone has to muck in and help when needed. This will stand them in good stead whatever career they chose to follow. Indeed a local businessman would only employ farmers' sons or daughters because they had the correct work ethic.

I live in a community where years ago horticulture and agriculture ruled, if your parents didn't directly work on the land, they worked to support those who did. I earnt plenty of pocket money stapling up cardboard boxes, painting over pruning cuts, filling corn sacks etc, but it was all unmechanised work in an industry that had plenty of supervision Plus we were no different to the other kids.
Now the vast majority have parents who work 9 - 5 Monday to Friday, and there is no opportunity to get involved in their work, indeed most have probably never even seen where their parents work. Remember years ago when the lorry drivers had the kids with them during the school holidays, you never see it now as the haulage firms won't allow it, likewise the number of digger drivers who learnt from dad on a Saturday morning, they wouldn't be allowed on site now. The result is that the few whose parents do work for themselves may well feel that they shouldn't have to help Dad as their friends don't.

I would rather like my daughter to take over the family business, its what both myself and my father have between us worked 55 years for, she will however only do it if she wants to. Everything I did for Dad was because I wanted to, not because I was told to. if that process was good enough 40 years ago, its good enough now.

 

[GTB]

All I wanted to do when I was young was farm and I was quite happy to slog my guts out to do it. My parents biggest mistake with me was not making me go away for a couple of years tp ag college. I didn't want to go as I was far too busy.

My biggest mistake with my boys was not making them go to work for someone else for a couple of years after they had been to ag college. They were keen and willing workers before they went but sadly got too used to the student way of life. After that if I cracked the whip they called me a slave driver. In reality they didn't know they were born compared to how hard I (willingly) worked at their age.

 

[DrWazzock]

The age of self reliance is passing and we move into the age of complete dependency. This is why health and safety now rules. Nobody has been brought up to live by their wits their fitness and their mental and physical agility.

As a kid, I swept the moss off asbestos roofs, and was told to tread on the nail heads to stop me going through. I wouldn't recommend that now but this is partly why I reisist the nanny state and find it alien.