What teachers do that makes cleanup time work, and how to bring that home

It was a regular Sunday afternoon in 2017. My oldest child was nine years old and a LEGO maniac. His entire room was wall-to-wall Legos. The top of his dresser was spilling over with his collection of LEGO airplanes, trucks, and cars. On the floor next to his bunk bed was a LEGO airport that was growing in size by the hour. Under his bed was crowded with a collection of bins and bins of LEGO bricks sorted by shape—not color—because while sorting by color is aesthetically pleasing, it is not the most efficient method for avid builders. IYKYK.

Inside This Post:

What’s really going on when your kid resists cleanup (and why it’s not about defiance)
The cleanup system that matches how your child’s brain works
Routines that take the power struggle out of cleanup time
The preschool teacher method I used at school and at home to make cleanup smoother
How to organize your play spaces to support deeper, longer, more creative play
What to do when your child flat-out refuses to help with clean-up time

If you know me, you know I am a lover of all things play. And with that, I have grown my tolerance for the mess that solid play sessions inevitably create. But on this particular Sunday? I was stressed. The girls had been taking turns passing a cold back and forth, which meant there hadn’t been a week in ages when all three kids had been fever-free and at school.

I entered his room with a full basket of clean and folded laundry, ready to be placed neatly in his drawers, when I stepped on a small, yellow, SHARP Lego, and I just about lost my ever-loving mind on my sweet, unsuspecting boy.

“We’re never buying another LEGO set again! This is insane. I cannot with this mess. I can’t even get to your drawers to put away the laundry…”

But then he looked up at me with this huge grin and said, “Mom, I’m building a sorting factory. Watch!” And he started organizing them by shape into these elaborate systems he’d created, complete with labels he’d made out of scraps of paper, tape, and his scrawny, little-boy handwriting.

You know what I realized? I’d lost the plot. The LEGO insanity wasn’t the problem. My expectations and my own adult stressors were clouding out the fact that real play is supposed to be messy—chaotic even. Because when kids are in it, they aren’t thinking about whether or not they are creating a mess. They are thinking about their own ability to create a world that matters to them. And that’s what builds confidence, executive function, and a sense of self.

Does that mean I should just allow the mess to get in the way of our life or of being able to put away laundry without injury? Hell no! But it gave me the perspective I needed to apologize and then collaborate with my kid on an approach to clean-up that was respectful and sustainable for both of us.

Here’s what nobody tells you about cleanup:

The goal isn’t a pristine play space. The goal is teaching your child how to care for their space and materials so they can keep doing the thing they love, like playing.

If your goal is for your child to play—a lot—and I assume it is because you are here and a valued member of the Workspace for Children community, then I know you value play. But that doesn’t mean I am going to say, Embrace the chaos! Your kids are only little once. One day you’ll miss the mess!

Nope. You do not need to live in a mess. This is your home, and you get to decide how you want it to feel and how things work inside of it. In fact, research confirms children play more productively and creatively in a tidy, organized space. So please don’t feel guilty setting limits around cleanup time.

When I was a young and naive preschool student teacher, I remember watching in awe as the head teacher flipped the overhead lights to signal the end of play and launched into a soft and melodic clean-up time song. With the exception of a few outliers, the children rolled their playdough creations back into neat balls and put all the tools they were using in the bin at the playdough table. In the block area, buildings came down without a crash and were neatly stacked on shelves. The children working on puzzles and reading on the rug stacked their items and put them away. In what felt like the blink of an eye, the messy, bustling classroom was returned to its orderly state.

Sooo… why doesn’t this work in real life? Why is it that at home, when parents ask their four-year-olds to clean up, even when they sing the magical clean-up song, do their children simply refuse?

What’s Really Happening When Clean-Up Time Turns Into a Battle of the Wills?

Let’s start with the obvious: No one likes to clean up. And for kids, it means stop doing the thing you love and start doing the thing that feels overwhelming and unfun.

In the classroom, the routine is practiced. Teachers know how to start very small and slow in the beginning of the year. They know how to use the environment and the children’s developmental capabilities to work towards the cleanup goal.

Let me break it down for you:

It is hard for young children to see the whole picture. You walk in and think, “Oh, just put the blocks away.” They walk in and see 147 individual items with no clear starting point.
Knowing what “belongs together” can also be tricky—it’s a developing skill. Adult brains automatically categorize (all the art supplies, all the dress-up clothes). Kid brains? Not yet. They need us to teach them these categories explicitly.
Holding multiple steps in their head. “Clean up your toys” sounds simple to us. To them, it’s: identify what needs cleaning, decide where it goes, physically move it there, remember what you were doing, repeat 50 times.

This is why the “just clean your room” approach fails. We’re asking them to do something they probably cannot do. But here’s the good news: once you understand what they CAN do at each age, cleanup becomes collaborative instead of combative.

If cleanup feels like too much for them and for you, the next part walks you through what works at each age and how to make it easier on everyone.

This part is for paid subscribers. 👇

The “Cleanup Apprentice” System
Here is the method I used with my own kids and the one I taught dozens of children in my years working in early childhood classrooms. It works because it matches how kids’ brains develop.

The Three Levels of Cleanup Support
Think of yourself as a scaffold: present and supportive when they need you, stepping back as they grow capable.

Level 1: You’re the Crew Chief (Ages 2–4)
You’re doing most of the work here, and that’s exactly right. Your job is to:

Work alongside them and keep the tasks minimal
Give one specific job: “Your job is to put the animals in this bucket.”
Narrate what you’re doing: “I’m putting all the cars in this basket.”

Make it social and connected, and part of the play, not an afterthought or a chore

Level 2: You’re the Project Manager (Ages 4–6)
Now they can handle more, but they still need you present and directing traffic:

Break it into clear zones: “You be in charge of the art table, I’ll do the blocks.”
Check in and celebrate progress: “You organized the markers and they’ll be ready for when we want to color tomorrow!”
Offer choices: “Should we tackle the stuffed animals or the dress-up clothes first? What do you think?”

Level 3: You’re the Consultant (Ages 6+)
They’re capable of independent cleanup but need a little coaching:

Set them up for success: “You’ve got 15 minutes before dinner. What’s your plan?”
Be available for support: “I am right in the kitchen if you get stuck or need a hand.”
“Last time you did magnetic tiles first and cars last. That seemed to work well.”

The System We Use When the Mess Gets Big

I learned this system teaching three-year-olds at a progressive preschool in NYC. The children in my care were phenomenal block builders and routinely used every block on our shelf, which meant some pretty epic cleanup sessions at the end of the day. In our half-day preschool, we shared our physical classroom. My class used it in the mornings, and another teacher, with an entirely separate set of three-year-olds, used it in the afternoon. So we had to reset the space every single day.

Here is how we attacked it:

As part of our cleanup routine, we had a planning meeting where kids could tell something to the group about their structure, take a picture, or make a comment on someone else’s work.
Then, we assigned jobs. Some kids were stackers, some were pushers, and some were shelvers.
Everyone tackles their job. The stacker stacks blocks, three high. The pusher pushes the stacks to the block shelf. The shelver puts the blocks on the shelf.

This system works because it breaks down a seemingly overwhelming task into manageable parts. And because young children love meaningful jobs and being part of a team. That feeling of “I helped make this happen!” builds intrinsic motivation far more effectively than stickers, threats, or bribes ever could. When children see themselves as capable contributors to the family, it dramatically reduces power struggles while boosting their self-esteem.

A tidy play area and boosted self-esteem? Yes, please.

But, Why Not Just Dump the Toys All Into a Bin and Call It a Day?

Organization Systems Matter When It Comes to Play

Imagine trying to cook dinner by rummaging through a junk drawer versus having your ingredients neatly arranged on a shelf. That’s the difference organization makes for kids.

When they can see materials clearly organized, they:

Play more creatively and find what they need
Clean up more willingly because they know where things go
Develop critical sorting and categorization skills
Build independence when they don’t need you to find things for them

The best part? Longer, more focused play sessions for them and more downtime for you.

Small Things That Make Cleanup Easier

The Reset Routine
Instead of saving cleanup for the end of the day when everyone’s fried, build in mini-resets. Instead of cleaning everything up, just have them pick up the scattered toys that are NOT part of their play. Before snack, before outdoor play, before dinner. Doing a reset instead of a full cleanup keeps things more manageable for everyone.

Everything Lives Somewhere
Everything needs a home. Not just “the everything toy bin” but “the small animals bin, the Magnatile shelf, the bin of cars or playsilks.” When kids know exactly where things belong, cleanup stops being a guessing game.

Want to go above and beyond? Take photos of what each shelf/bin should look like when organized. Print them and tape them right there. Game changer for visual learners.

When Cleanup Goes Sideways (Because It Will)

Let’s talk about what to do when your best-laid plans fall apart/ when you lose your shit because the mess is just… too much.

They’re melting down before cleanup even starts:
Stop right there… Check the basics—are they hungry? Tired? Coming down with something? Sometimes the most productive thing you can do is say, “You know what? Let’s skip cleanup right now and come back to it after snack.” The mess will still be there. Your relationship is more important. If you can, get in there yourself and put toys in piles by category or clean up half to make it feel less overwhelming for your child. Sometimes, too much is just too much.

They’re doing the bare minimum:
First, check your expectations. Is “good enough” actually... good enough for today? If not, get specific: “I see you put away three things so far, and there are 12 more to go. What’s your plan to get to fifteen things before we leave? You start, and I will come back and try to guess which ones you did.”

Forget the threats. Forget the bribes. If you are having one of those days where cleanup is just not worth the effort or the fight:

“Today it’s too hard for you to clean up, and I am going to do it for you. Tomorrow, we can clean up as we go and decide if that feels like a better plan moving forward.”

And by the way? It is completely normal if your kids resists cleanup time. Balancing cleanup time with play is genuinely one of the trickier parts of raising kids because it sits right at the intersection of their developmental limitations and our need for a functioning home. Some days, cleanup will flow beautifully. Some days, you’ll end up doing most of it yourself while they whine about screens and snacks. Both are normal and okay.

Focus on progress, not getting it right. Think less about “clean up time,” and more about resetting the space to get it ready for the next time you want to play.

Thank you so much for being here. I appreciate this Substack community so much. I would be so grateful if you could leave a little comment or heart below. Even better? Forward this to your group chat. x. Lizzie

Why the Clean-Up Song Works in Preschool and Fails in Your Living Room