Chores for teens take on a completely different form from when you are working alongside your little ones and being their helper in their daily jobs. These are the mentoring years! You now have a thinking mature person as your help in the home. The bonus is that this is one of the times in your teen’s day where you are going to chat with one another and be their mentor.

When you hit the teen years you should be well on your way to having a happy and capable helper in your home. If not then these tips about chore for teens will help you closer to your goal.

Parents, who have diligently been training their children from a young age in how to help in the home, will find that by now they can set their teen a chore and check when they are done for completeness. But even at this age chores for teens can be a marvelous platform for you to train your young adult in neatness, perfect execution and a good work ethic as you work together.

Christine Fields says in her book Lifeskills for Kids : “The attitudes and attributes that make a good employee are the same attitudes and attributes that make a good kid.” So whether your child is self employed one day or employed by another, you are laying down good habits for the rest of their adult lives.

Perhaps you have not trained your teen as well as you would have liked too and you are facing sullen faces or untidy rooms everyday. Do not give in to frustration or anger...slowly build your relationship and value the relationship above the chore.

Most teens need to know the “why” for every instruction. You now have a wonderful opportunity to help them gain long term vision for their lives as adults. You also can use all these chore times as opportunities to be close to your teen when there are many other things demanding their attention.

Paid chores also feature here, but it is important that your teen does most chores because they want to be a valuable part of the family team. A teen can adopt this mindset from their parents who seek to make family life cohesive and exciting.

Your teen may also want to start earning an income. If you do not want to pay your teen for chores done around the house, then I suggest that you encourage them to think entrepreneurially. If your teen has a computer and a hobby, interest or specific knowledge on a subject be sure to check out Site Build IT!

Other ideas for them to earn money is through babysitting, cleaning cars in the neighborhood, walking dogs and selling baked items. Encourage them to help, just for the sake of helping, within the home with a younger sibling perhaps, or outside of the home by helping a grocery burdened mom or elderly person.

Assuming that your teen has their personal hygiene and room chores in place you can expect them to do some of the following chores for teens: You will find details on how to do these chores on the chore lists page

Animal Care

Preparing meals

Doing the laundry

Vacuuming the house

Mopping floors

Cleaning windows

Baking

Washing cars

Pool care

Mowing lawn (older teens)

Recycling

Depending on the level of maturity of your older teen and their interests you can also consider the following:

Car oil change

Replace bulbs (CAUTION)

Basic household repairs

Basic household maintenance

Basic mending of clothes

Ironing

Meal plans

To get started you can download these free printable chore charts for teens until you are ready to make your own.

You will need Adobe Reader to download these charts.

Blank chore chart for teen girl
Blank chore chart for teen boy
Chore chart for teen with specific chores

Other pages relating to chores for teens:
Make your own chore chart
Entrepreneurship for teens
Homeschooling your high schooler
Raising magnanimous children

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