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Helping Hands
Teaching Your Toddler to Pitch In By Lisa Elliott Diehl
"She helps load and unload clothes from the washer and dryer when I'm doing laundry, and she hands me clean dishes from the dishwasher while I put them away," Williams says. "She also asks to help when I'm cooking big fun for her, big mess for me, but that's OK. She gets a lot of gratification from this, so I try not to discourage her, even when 'helping' means more work for me."
One especially busy day, Williams says she gave Susie a snack, hoping she'd stay put while Williams worked on the laundry. Susie's "helping" usually added about 10 minutes to the amount of time it took Williams to fold a load of clothes.
"When she realized what I was doing, she started crying and ran to me, saying, 'Susie help Mama! Susie help!' Of course, I calmed her and immediately put her to work," Williams says. "She happily handed me one item after another until the dryer was empty, then toddled back to her snack."
Williams says she always thought she was preparing her daughter to eventually be responsible for chores of her own by teaching her simple tasks like putting clothes in the dryer. But she didn't realize just how much her daughter benefited from these small tasks helping Mommy.
"I still marvel at the depth of her need to participate," Williams says. "Even at this early age, she is finding satisfaction in playing a role in the life of her family. She seemed to be saying, 'See? I matter, too!'"