How to Tackle Clutter in the Kid’s Room

Kid’s rooms present a unique challenge when it comes to tackling clutter. No matter how good you are at organizing, in a kids’ room there is going to be a kid who takes more pride in disorganization. Clutter in kid’s rooms needs to be tackled in a different way entirely. Here are some helpful ideas to get you started…

Keep small parts together

The thing about kids’ rooms is that it seems to be the small things that make the biggest messes. Small parts to puzzles, games, or block sets can spread out to all corners of the room making it seem more cluttered than it may be. By simply having a spot for all the small things and maybe having them higher up so that your kids cannot grab them without your supervision, will help a great deal in keeping a cluttered mess more manageable. Also, keeping small things uncluttered will make the room safer for your child especially if there is another baby in the house who you may not want having access to such small parts.

Installing shelves can help.

Label with pictures

Children should have some responsibility when it comes to keeping their rooms clean. Of course the level of responsibility that they have should also be directly associated with their age and ability level. Most children need help remembering where things go in their rooms. For children who cannot read labels, use drawings or photos to mark where certain things should go. For example, if your son likes cars, get him a bin where he can put all of his cars in and use an index card with a picture of a car on it to label that bin as the one where the cars should go. Make the process of cleaning fun by using colors and shapes that are interesting to your child.

Make sure fragile things are out of reach

While things like figurines, lamps or other keepsakes are nice, it may not be the best idea to have them on display in a child’s room. In most cases these fragile things can be dangerous and easily broken. If you have to store little knick knacks in your child’s room store then in a high place where they can be out of your child’s reach. Using the vertical space available to you by installing shelves can be a big help not only in keeping your kids safer but in also tackling the clutter of the room.

Less is more

Even after all of these helpful suggestions, you are just kidding yourself if you think that your child is going to suddenly start organizing their things and keeping their room neat and tidy at all times. This is just not going to happen, especially if their rooms are packed to the ceiling with stuff. To make the job of tackling clutter easier for both you and your little one, get rid of those things that you can live without. Some suggestions for toys that you really need not hang on to are toys that are broken, missing pieces, cheap (like the ones that come free in fast food meals) or toys that your child is not interested in playing with.

Change behavior

Once you have gone through the trouble of organizing your child’s room into a well organized and clutter free space, make sure that you keep it that way. Help your child learn how to keep their room clean. Have a routine where there is a regular time every day when messes are cleaned or teach your child that a new toy should not be taken from its place until another toy is returned to its place. You could set up a reward system for having a clean room. It is also a good idea to have a standing rule that if a new toy enters the room there should either be a place designated for it or have en existing toy be retired.