House Rules Ideas: FC

Junebride007

I know that before we are placed I want to have a copy of our house rules. Posted and hopefully in a cute way. Printed out in a fun font in a picture frame.. What are some good examples of house rules? We are being approved for Age three- eleven, any gender, any race, open to sibling pairs. We do not have biological children so there really aren't any specific house rules that we have currently. The only one I can think of is Dinner Time is Family Time as DH and I always try to eat one meal a day together at the table. Thanks in advance!!

CaptainSerious

Sorry, they aren't cute, but these are our biggest rules: 

1.  No hitting, scratching, or fighting in any physical way.  Hands are for hugging and showing love, not hitting or expressing anger. (you'll probably want to take out the "showing love" for foster)

2.  No throwing in anger, ever.  Also, no throwing anything in the house.

3.   Always show respect for others.  (This means you listen and look them in the eye when they speak, do not interrupt, do not make fun of them or sass them, and take their feelings into consideration)

4.  This family supports one another, and always tries to lift one another up.  We do not put one another down, ever.

5.  Diner is family time.  You don't have to eat, but you do have to sit at the table and participate in the conversation.

6.  We treat each other with love, always.

I've heard it best to write rules only in the positive, so you would say "we walk in the house" instead of "don't run," but with my kids, I've found that they wouldn't necessarily get it.  Just because we walk in the house doesn't mean that sometimes we can't run, too, you know?  Similarly with just "hands are for hugging" without mentioning "no hitting," and so on.

elissaann26

Here is a post I did about our house rules with Artichoke and Zucchini.

https://www.redheadinraleigh.com/2012/08/house-rules.html

My honest opinion is that I don't think you can have House Rules set to go for an age range that is that wide.  I just think for them to be useful, you will need to adjust them depending on what ages your foster kids are.  Also, I am a HUGE proponent in including the child in creating the house rules.  There were rules we would have never thought to include that Artichoke REALLY wanted and alleviated a lot of his anxiety.  I think this was the first step in him trusting us.  We took his suggestion, wrote it down (on our dry erase rule board) and then we made sure that everyone in the house (including the dog) followed all of the rules.  In the first month we had him, he would ask "Are we allowed to xyz?"  "No one can xyz in our house.  It is one of our rules, right?" 

We also have specific rules for certain times: dinner table rules, quiet time rules, bedtime rules, and bathroom rules.  All of these would need to be tweak quite a bit for each different age.  But if you are interested in our specifcs for a 2 and 5 year old, I can share them.

elissaann26

I will say that I wanted to get something cute like the below for our family rules.  I think something like this is a great way to show your families priorities and maybe non negotiable rules.  But I know we needed more concrete rules like No Hitting for the kids to understand our expectations. 

 As PP mentioned, we tried to explain the rules using the positive view- We wear walking feet inside.  But I will also agree that our boys wouldn't "get it" unless we clearly said No Running Inside.

CaptainSerious

The other thing I learned is that our house/family rules evolve.  We do not have them written down.  When each of the boys came to us, we talked with them and explained that we have a few rules and would go from there.  We explained our hard and fast rules, and gave examples of the types of consequences for breaking a rule. We asked if they had any questions, and did our best to answer them.

This worked far better for M, who was about 7 (or more likely 9), than it did for J, at 5.  M was very worried about what would happen if he broke something, so he asked about that.  We explained that if it was an accident, nothing would happen, but if he did it on purpose, there would be a consequence.  We also explained that however it happened, it was important he tell us immediately, so we could take care of anything that needed it, rather than trying to hide it, and that a cover-up would likely get him in trouble (or more trouble).

For the initial transition period, we didn't usually impose a consequence each time the boys broke a rule, unless we could be certain they knew the behavior was not okay.  We figured they had a lot to remember, and if the rule was something they could have forgotten or a minor issue, we just reminded them of the rule.

Because our rules are fluid, though, we never impose consequences for behavior we haven't explicitly told the the boys was not allowed.  If, for example, they went into the guest room and used something they found in a guests' belongings without asking, we would not impose a consequence, because they might not have known that what they were doing was not okay.  After all, it was in our house, and we try to share all we can with them.  Instead, it would lead to a conversation explaining why it's not okay, and a new rule would be made.  If it happened again, we would impose a consequence for breaking the rule.

I found this fluid arrangement to work quite well.  I couldn't tell you of all our rules off the top of my head, but they all have to do with respecting others and taking care of the home and one another.  We all work together, because that's what families do.  We do favors for one another, because we like it when someone helps us.  These aren't really rules, but more family practices/values.

DaisyZH

I don't have any rules suggestions but just wanted to say I've seen a lot of super-cute framed rules on pinterest, for the format that might be helpful.