On Mon, 22 Aug 2005 16:19:57 EDT, "Jeff"
wrote:

I would let the other kids
and you vote on how good the meal was, and rewarad the cook accordingly.

This strikes me as something that would produce a very different
atmosphere than the one I prefer to live in. Maybe if all of you
thrive on competition and public critique it might motivate you. I
don't. I do have to say that I recently benefited from being a guest
at two dinner parties hosted by men who were trying to impress and
outdo each other, where the food and its presentation were splendid.

Perhaps a highly-rated meal gets special privledges or results in less
chores. Or maybe, when there is a highly-rated meal, the whole family goes
to the movies, miniture golf or something.

In my experience, sincere praise and requests for second servings also
get the desired response, whether the cook is a teenager, another
adult, or me.



You can also encourage your
younger kids to help. To me, it seems that there is no reason why this
shouldn't be a family acitvity (certainly eating should be), even if one of
the twins is the head chef and the other kids are the assistant chefs.

You might also encourage them to cooperate, so that one prepares the salad
and vegetables and the other does the rest, and they switch.

I like all those ideas.

Louise