Organising my Daughter- Part 2

Still on my mission to create a sense of calm in the house, I sat down to think about what other day to day events create arguments between my eldest daughter and me. Now that i have solved the "getting ready for school" arguments that were happening frequently,  and put a stop to the "i forgot i was supposed to do that" dance that seemed to occur when asking her to do her chores, the next most common disturbances in the force happen at homework and room cleaning times.  So what can i do to help ease the tension....

To figure this out i had to find out what it was about each job that she having trouble with. When it came to cleaning her room, i found that it was the "big picture" that daunted her. Seeing a big amount of mess and not knowing where to start. So i went in and i cleaned her room myself, taking note of what jobs i did and what order i did them in. I then made a list and printed it out. I waited until the next time her room required cleaning and pulled out the list and went into her room with her. Together we followed the list and cleaned her room, one job at a time. Now that she knows what is expected and can see the steps stuck up on her bedroom wall, there have been fewer fights about room cleaning. I consider this as a WIN.

Here is a copy of our Room Cleaning List

Next problem to tackle...the homework fights. I am not silly.... I do not expect to be able to solve these. But what i can do is try to prevent some of the tension from the lead up to homework time. I'm sure that most of you can sympathise with my daughters usual homework stalling techniques. 1st it always seems to take my daughter at least 10 mins to locate her homework book, next her pencil seems to disappear. Once the pencil has been located it of course requires sharpening, and yep you guessed it...  the sharpener has conveniently vanished. By this time i am starting to reach my boiling point. How can you have no idea where any of these things are when you were only using them yesterday??

My solution... a homework station. I went to office works and i bought a pretty pink desk accessory stand. I put her homework book into one of the slots. i filled the little cup holes with all her other homework needs. in the top cup there are coloured pencils and ruler, the middle cup has lead pencils, and a pair of safety scissors, the bottom cup holds an eraser and a pencil sharpener. Now that everything is in the same place im hoping the only stress left for homework time is getting to write neatly. 

This is our new pink homework caddy