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DS is 27 months and has just recently started picking up his toys when asked. We actually started around 2 because our daycare provider made an off-hand comment about how he refused to pick up at school. We had much more success with starting by saying “put the red block in the bin” basically being super specific. If I just said “pick up your toys” then it wouldn’t happen. Now, I can say “pick up all your blocks” and he will do it - (most of the time ) but I usually have to do it with him or at least be right there. We also watched the Daniel tiger episode about cleaning up and sing the song every time. And we make it a huge celebration when he does it “wow! DS is such a big helper! Daddy, did you see DS pick up?!? Yay!!!”

DH and I just were wondering this last night.... as we sat down in the livingroom surrounded by toys to clean up at 10:30 pm! HAHA. Our routine is to clean up their toys during nap and after bedtime and we were pondering when we really should be including them.

Right now if we try to do some cleaning up mid afternoon with them - we can get a whole bunch put away then moments later DS will dump it all back out on the floor and its complete: WHOMP WHOMP.

I get the feeling I should be doing a better job of modeling it to them at 20 months...but I'm so demotivated by the immediate dump out! haha.

Following!

I think it depends on the kid. Our oldest actually enjoys cleaning up - so whenever we would do a big clean of the living room, he'd then want to do a big clean of his room (with help) - that started around 2. Now at 4, he'll occasionally clean his room all by himself without any prompting. And we just started getting into the habit (at 4.5) of picking up the living room every night before bed. My 3 year old is also involved, but definitely not as consistent as my older.

I'm ambivalent about picking up everything daily and don't require it. My son (who's 7) likes to make up stories with his Legos, blocks, and Playmobil people and he makes little scenes with them all over the floor. The "stories" are usually created/told over multiple days at this point. I remember doing this sort of thing as a child too, and I'm grateful that my mom didn't make me tidy things up every day. I feel like this sort of play is really important for the development of his ability to put thoughts in order/write coherently, so I actually don't make him clean those up, even though they tend to be in the middle of our living room floor.

I know he knows HOW to pick up (because we do it before guests come over or when I need to mop the floor or when I notice that he's not really using certain toys), and that's good enough, I think. When he was smaller, I adhered to a similar rule: things that aren't being used/used very soon get put away when we're done with them. That "rule" still left a lot of things out on a fairly regular basis, because little kids move from one thing to the next pretty quickly! My tolerance of certain types of disorder has gone way down since becoming a parent, basically. (I'm still a maniac about actual cleanliness--as in, there are no crumbs or drops of food on my table or floor after meals, ever, and everyone washes their hands immediately before and after eating--but untidiness is MUCH less of an issue for me.)

We have a playroom and I decided that my son could leave his toys in play in that room. Big things like train or hotwheel tracks, I let him leave because those take a lot of effort to set up.

Smaller things I do ask that he is aware of what he leaves on the floor. We talk a lot about game pieces and keeping them all together so you don't compromise the game.

Lastly, I had to give up my hangups around organizing. If all the toys are in bins, that's a win. I don't worry if the play food is mixed in with the hot wheels.

My son is 2.5 and apparently does *great* at school with picking up/clean up time... not so much at home! I try to encourage him but I don't stress about it too much. Mostly because picking up the toys is after dinner, right before we are going upstairs for bed and bath. And by that point, after a day at daycare (he usually won't nap there), he is a WRECK and throwing things everywhere, crying and screaming from being so overtired so it seems like a waste of time.

My LO will be 3 next week and maybe just the last month or two we have tried to focus on picking up her toys every night before bed (previously me or DH did it). We don't have a play room and have a small house so everything gets picked up every night. We definitely have to help and cajole her to do it, I know she is much better about it at daycare. We sing or play clean up songs and that helps too. It's hard to remember to do it every night though bc it's definitely going to be a slight battle and we are so used to doing it ourselves!

But I definitely think it's a very important skill. We need to add other cleaning up after ourselves activities too like clearing her dishes after dinner...

My 2.5 year old does well picking up toys when told.... We started asking him to help pick up right when he turned two. What helps is his older brother is great a cleaning up and will initiate the clean-up time. We have bins for most toys so it's pretty easy to just dump everything back into their respective spots easily

We always tidy before nap and do a full pick up before bed. We have always done it while DD is awake and part of the process. As soon as she was walking we had her "help". In the beginning she would put one or two things away while we did the rest. Somewhere between 2 and 2.5 we started making her do more of the actual picking up and she was very consistent. But now at 3 she is expected to be actively helping clean up until it is done. I obviously do more because I am faster and less distracted. If she doesn't help at night we take away one bedtime book - which is a huge motivator for her.

We sing the clean up song from Daniel Tiger throughout the whole process. We have also made sure that all toys have a designated spot. She does much better when she knows exactly where to put things. We try to give her specific tasks while cleaning up - put all of the blocks in the box, put all of the play food away in the kitchen, put the books in the basket, etc. I can't just say clean up.

We started early with this for both of our boys. DS1 started early, and we sang the song they sing at daycare for helping to clean up. We also made it fun for him in that every toy he put in his bucket got a high five.

For DS2, it's so much easier when there's an older brother to model behavior. He just fell right into it. He's 2 years, 5 months, and he's been cleaning up well before he was 2 years. If he says no (exerting control), we make sure he understands that he cannot take out another toy until the one he's finished using is cleaned up and put away. This is usually motivation enough to get him to clean up the old toy, or continue playing with it without making more of a mess.

At night, everyone cleans up together. We're a big teamwork household - everyone pitches in. I don't put their plates in the dishwasher when they're finished with dinner. It's their job...and I definitely have to remind them of it, but even DS2 does it. It helps that DH is on board with helping when he sees something needs to be done. We are all one big team that helps the household stay clean and tidy. It can be a mess at some point, but we all help to clean it up!

DS was totally picking up his toys at 18 months, but it was a game to him. He was copying me. He could pick everything up, and then ten minutes later, tip the whole box back onto the floor.

I started demanding a proper cleanup when he was two. I'm not proud of how I handled it... basically I'd threaten that if anything was on the floor at bedtime, "cleanup mommy style" would happen, and whatever I had to pick up without his help would be locked up for a few days. I'm more laid back about it now, but we're in a bigger place and the kids can make a mess in their room where no one will trip on it.

@Mrs. Pickle: My daughter is 2.5 and is the same. She's pretty good at picking up toys when asked, but I have to repeat the instructions and help her as we go along. If I don't participate, she doesn't really do it on her own. She really likes being mommy's "big helper" though.