Back in the 50s, children worked for their parents starting at a very young age. Today, do kids even know how to do their family’s laundry? Now, more adults are focused on student’s future in the workforce but how much do kids know about their future life at home? NAEye surveyed 7 students from NAI to see if they could complete simple task at home and the results are, surprisingly, not bad.

• 5 out of 7 students know how to write a check.
• 7 out of 7 students know how to do laundry.
• 6 out of 7 students know how to use a dishwasher.
• 5 out of 7 kids know how to mow the lawn.
• 7 out of 7 kids know how to use a credit or debit card.
• 7 out of 7 kids know how to run a vacuum.
• 4 out of 7 kids know how to make spaghetti.
• 1 out of 7 students know how to sew.
• 4 out of 7 students know how to make a pizza.

NAEye reached out to NAI’s FCS teacher, Mrs. Clawson, and requested her ideas on what tasks kids should be able to complete before they move on from from the adolescence stage into adulthood.

Financial Basics: Kids should be able to budget their money, know the basics of taxes, online banking, credits, loans, and investments.

Clothing care: Laundry should be a simple chore at home and also hand stitching and quality construction.

Nutrition and cooking skills: Nutrient dense foods/ingredients is important and how to prepare them safely and successfully.

Resume writing and interview skills: This is a very important topic for this is the time in their lives where they are looking into jobs and what career they want to pursue.

Mechanics: tire and oil changing for a car can also be important for teenagers are getting cars and learning responsibility for taking care of a car.

Home repairs: this is a topic kids take a class for in middle school but most forget about the basics of using the repair skills such as measuring, painting, and the correct use of a screwdriver or hammer.

After hearing from a very educated professional on this topic, NAEye surveyed the same students from NAI and asked them a different set of questions that were not asked in the previous survey:

• 2 out of 7 students knew how to write a resume for a job
• 4 out of 7 students knew how to properly set a dinner table
• 1 out of 7 students knew how to change oil or a tire in a car
• 5 out of 7 knew how the basics of painting a wall.

Some students were shocked that they had to know to how to complete these chores. Now, hopefully, they know that they it’s harder than some adults make it look and it takes quite some effort to have a successful homelife.