by Starr Sheets

Created on: November 25, 2007   Last Updated: February 23, 2010

As a single mother who worked until late evening, I had to learn to find some way to encourage my teens to get dinner cooked before I got home.

This situation has certainly improved over time and we now have a schedule that includes each able person in our home. The only one excluded is my five-year-old youngest son because obviously he is way too young for this task. However, he does get to help set the table and do other small chores to help out.

Each of the older children have taken whatever course was available on cooking that the school offered for at least one semester and then they could pick any other elective that they wanted no questions asked. This worked very well in helping them get the basics down early.

Also, they have been included in family get-togethers and cookouts all of their lives where we played a sort of game with the event. In their earlier years we each took turns picking a food at the grocery store that we had never eaten before and using it with our special family time. Everyone had to learn something about the food and we would talk about what we learned over dinner.

Now as I said we take turns on a schedule after a discussion on our preferences, such as would we prefer to do two days back-to-back and get it over for the week or have it separated with a day or two in between.

Starting in January, our schedule will rotate and change because of work schedule changes as I work long hours during tax season.

We try to work together and we are allowed to switch with whoever is willing when we have a bad day or just don't feel well as long as we make sure we cover when we are supposed to.

Part of the agreement involves dishes and because the teens hate doing dishes we agreed that whoever is cooking is responsible for the dishes that night. This made a huge impact on getting the teens involved in cooking.

One reason we decided we must come to an agreement is because of money and not being able to justify why we must scrape to pay some bills yet we could eat out when dinner hadn't been dealt with by the time I got in at nine or ten at night. Because we cut down on eating out we now have more money to do more interesting things together.

Then there are the bonus nights that happen on payday Fridays when and if we have been good and not been out to eat much and/or dinners were made in a timely manner and properly cleaned up by each person. This is when we go out somewhere that offers all you can eat or that we don't get to go too often and splurge a little on some extra fun.

Just keep in mind each family is different, but most teens love the opportunity to get their two cents added to the decision making. Allow their input and encourage their involvement in all aspects and you will see an attitude change with mundane duties such as cooking.

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