Do you have a job jar? There are two kinds of chores, those that are expected as members of the family, and the extra chores that they can do for extra spending money or an allowance. Using a job jar is a fun way to handle all those extra chores and allow you to control what options are available each week. Color coding is an easy way to handle at a glance what the chore is worth. I have different colored slips of paper for approximate time.
Examples:
White : 10 minutes
Vacuum a room, including edges
Sweep the back porch
Yellow: 30 minutes
Mow the yard
Weed the front/back yard
Blue: 45 minutes
Clean the car, inside and out
So, a slip of paper can be chosen based on the amount of time available, add dollars to be earned for that chore to the slip as well. When they are younger you may want to work with a point system instead of dollars and let them turn in points towards books or games or something else. After time you can allow them to turn in their points for items or money, eventually switching it over to money entirely as they learn the value of money.
To encourage chores to be done, it works better to pay out immediately. If they want something or they want to go out that evening and need money for a movie, they know what they have to do to earn it. You both benefit.
Rotate the slips out based on what needs to be done that week.
A job jar can be just that, a jar, a vase, a basket, or anything else you have handy. If you want a fun project to do with the kids if you have little ones is let them each decorate their own canning jar for their job jar.
We do this. We have 3 colors of index cards, yellow, blue and green. Green earns extra money, yellow is for extra long term money like earning up to a bicycle or saving to buy Christmas presents and blue is for "punishment or earn back" in lieu of grounding and such.
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