Free Play and Clean Up

[DaycareMom]

I have a mixed age group (2) 4 yos, 3 yo, 2 yo, and 6 mo old. We have circle/learning time, and set meals and nap time but the majority of our day is free play.
The all play with different toys and by the time we are ready to clean up, the room is destroyed! Then they all complain that they do not want to clean up.

Do you direct them to a certain free play area (ex house, kitchen) have them all play together then clean up and move to a different area?

How do you get them all to clean up? What if they refuse to clean up - what is the consequence?

Thanks for any help/advice/suggestions!

[Rockgirl]

Mine can play anywhere, but they must clean their mess up before moving on to something else. Even really young ones can learn this.

[JoseyJo]

I have a mixed age group (2) 4 yos, 3 yo, 2 yo, and 6 mo old. We have circle/learning time, and set meals and nap time but the majority of our day is free play.
The all play with different toys and by the time we are ready to clean up, the room is destroyed! Then they all complain that they do not want to clean up.

Do you direct them to a certain free play area (ex house, kitchen) have them all play together then clean up and move to a different area?

How do you get them all to clean up? What if they refuse to clean up - what is the consequence?

Thanks for any help/advice/suggestions!

Our group is about the same as yours minus the baby. Our schedule is like this:

free play from arrival until breakfast
Breakfast
Circle Time
1 hour outside fp
learning activities
30 min inside fp
Art
fp until lunch
lunch
nap
PM snack
30 min fp
1 hour outside or group activities
fb until p/u

At the end of each fp session everyone picks up all of their toys. We also p/u toys through out fp as we finish with them (ie, p/u blocks before going to play barbies).

We have a clean up song we like to sing while we are picking up. Everyone picks up the things they played with.

Normally it takes the kids about 2-3 minutes to clean up then we are on to the next activity!

When we have a child (almost always a new younger child) who refuses to p/u we "help" them by taking their hands in ours and assisting them to pick up the toys. They decide very quickly they would rather just do it themselves!

[preschoolteacher]

I think directing them to a certain play area kills the idea of free play time! It also is a way of adults trying to "take away" a problem rather than teach kids how to deal with their toys and learn to clean up their messes.

I think with this age group, you will most likely be doing most of the cleaning, but each of the kids (except the 6 mo. old!) should help in some way. Some days, if that is just picking up and putting away one toy, so be it.

A couple ideas:

1. Can you remove all clutter and take away/weed out toys? Maybe you have 10 trains and they all get thrown on the floor. If you weed it down to just 2 trains, there is less to clean up. You can put the toys you remove in storage and rotate them back into your space late--free "new" toys for the kids!

2. Does each toy have a place? Is it clearly labeled? Do the kids know exactly where to put each toy? I have open baskets that kids can see into--no tubs or toyboxes that they have to dig through to find what they want. Each basket has a clear luggage tag attached to it with a picture of what should go inside of it. Then there is another picture (the same one) laminated on the shelf where the basket belongs.

3. How to let the kids know it's time to clean up? You could play a "clean up" song that lets them know it's time to begin. If you do a Circle Time in the beginning of the day, you could ask them how many songs they think it will take them to clean up today. Maybe it will take them 5 songs to clean up. The next day, you can challenge them to clean up in 4 songs! This will challenge the older kids.

Good luck!

[AmyKidsCo]

I allow my children to take toys pretty much wherever they want, except art materials need to stay at the table.

When it's clean up time I have a couple of strategies. First we all start cleaning up together, then when their attention starts to lag I'll ask "Who wants to pick up the blocks?" (or books, or whatever) If one child isn't helping I'll give them a choice, "Do you want to put away the blocks, books, or something else?"

Sometimes I'll ask the group to find things that are blue (or another color, striped, polka-dotted, only one color, two colors or more, etc). When they're tired of that I'll ask them to find things that are hard (or soft, big, small, bumpy, smooth, etc). If we're still not done I'll give each of them a turn picking what kind of thing to find and put away.

Finally I'll lead them in a hunt for "Sneaky Toys." The thing about sneaky toys is that they hide from us and we have to be reaaaaaaaly quiet to find them before they run away, so we tiptoe around and whisper as we find them. It works every time!

[Blackcat31]

Everyone cleans up. I don't do the whole "But I didn't play with that.." game. If you are here, you clean.

What I do though to make it fun is I have flashcards with pictures of the toys we have (I took the pictures and laminated them myself) and each child will pick a card and whatever toy is on their card, they are responsible for cleaning up.

I have no clue why they think it is fun to do it that way but they all get super excited waiting to see what card they got and what cards their friends got.

So far it works great with my group.

I let the kids take out whatever toys they want (with the exception of art materials needing to stay at the table like Amy said) but I also have only a few things out at once so even if they took everything out at one time, it isn't all that much so it isn't overwhelming for them when clean up time comes.

[EntropyControlSpecialist]

I remind them to clean up a toy before moving on to a new one. I have 2 1/2-5 year olds.

At the end, the clean up song comes on and everyone helps clean up everything that is out.

[Cradle2crayons]

I have a mixed age group (2) 4 yos, 3 yo, 2 yo, and 6 mo old. We have circle/learning time, and set meals and nap time but the majority of our day is free play.
The all play with different toys and by the time we are ready to clean up, the room is destroyed! Then they all complain that they do not want to clean up.

Do you direct them to a certain free play area (ex house, kitchen) have them all play together then clean up and move to a different area?

How do you get them all to clean up? What if they refuse to clean up - what is the consequence?

Thanks for any help/advice/suggestions!

When mine are done with x toys they clean them up before they are allowed to play with anything else. If not, it would take way too much time to clean up.

Also sometimes I'd have some leave early and not clean up their messes and the others would get mad

[MsMimi]

My kids have to put the toy they're playing with away before they get a new toy out. They also know that if there's a toy on the floor that's not being played with they're supposed to pick it up and put it away, whether they played with it or not.

Personally, I'd put the majority of the toys away, set out two or three (say blocks, cars and barbies, for example) and tell them that once they learn to put those toys away properly you'll add a new toy. If they do a good job cleaning up, add another toy the next day and tell them the same thing, if they can clean up the toys properly you'll add another toy. Keep at it until all of the toys are back out. Consequences of not putting the toys away? No new toys the next day. Once the toys are all back out if they try to go back to not cleaning, start removing the toys one at a time.

To get them interested in cleaning you can make a game out of it. Who can clean up the fastest/quietest who can find the most blocks and put them away, who can find all of the yellow toys and put them where they go, etc..

If they're not used to cleaning up it can take a little while to get used to, but once they know it's what you expect them to do, and that at clean-up time the only acceptable choice is cleaning up, they'll start doing it. Just be firm/consistent with your expectations of them at clean-up.

[LK5kids]

Mine are allowed to play anywhere but must clean up before they go on to something else and I also ring a bell and play the clean up song at 9:30. The clean up song I have is on Kathy Poelker's CD Amazing Musical Moments. It starts with a whistle and is very upbeat and they love it.

I have used a sticker chart for years...(it helps young ones learn to read their names and older ones learn how to read their friend's names - just a bonus) and if they don't clean up-no sticker. These things work really well. We all work at it.

I have done both.....let toys be out till clean up & all toys/centers available or clean as you go. I have never limited toys. All areas are open except for late day/pick up time or the 1/2 hour I am making lunch. Then I allow maybe two things....like Duplos & doll house.

Once they are three yrs and older they clean up very quickly!

We have circle, then morning snack, then outside. If the weather is bad we usually have another free play.

After nap they Just don't seem to get a lot out. We also go outside.

I had a group of young two's and under this winter, so it was a bit of a challenge. They did learn after a few months and do great now! But I had to have less in bins .....like 1/4 of the food & dishes, 10 small blocks, 6 little people and lots of self-contained toys with NO pieces! They don't dump anymore and they just were not able to pick up tons of stuff.

In the past if I had a child that would not clean up I would have to get firm and leave out a pile for them to pick up ( after I tried different behavior management techniques) and no playing till they did their share and picked up their pile of toys. It just needs to be a group effort in my mind.

[wdmmom]

All of my toys are in bins and those that are not are on a shelf because they are too big. Toys stay in the playroom and you can only have 2 toys out at a time. Whether that be 2 bins or 1 bin and 1 big toy. I don't do dumping and toys must be picked up before moving onto the next activity.

For example: If the kids are playing blocks and with the train set, they must put the train tracks away and put the blocks back in the bin before moving onto the lego table or to play tea party at the kitchen.

If no one wants to pick up and I have to, the toys get put away for a week. If it's a reoccurring problem, free play turns into station play. 1 kid plays with the lego table, 1 kid is a the toy kitchen, 1 kid is playing trucks and 1 is playing dolls. Rotate them every 15 minutes. It's an easy way to kill an hour with minimal clean up!