How the hell do you know the kids are raising their younger siblings in that family? Have you lived with them?

What’s a typical day in your house like? How do you maintain control over what has to be pretty chaotic? How do you make a household of 19 people run smoothly?


Our #1 goal is to lead our children to seek a close relationship with God & give Him every area of their lives. We purpose to start each day with a family Bible study, reading a chapter of Proverbs that corresponds with the day of the month. We have heart to heart talks with each of the older children regularly. We try to keep up with their attitudes & actions.

We desire for each child to develop a learning spirit & a servant's heart that looks for opportunities to serve others. It is a joy to see our children becoming best friends. If they can learn to treat their brothers and sisters like they want to be treated, then they can learn to get along with just about anyone along life's way.

We try to begin our daily routine with personal hygiene (get dressed, brush teeth, comb hair, etc...). Each older child has a younger buddy (or two) that they help. We eat breakfast & read the Proverb of the day at 8:00AM, then we "quick clean" the house (older child & their buddy work together to clean their jurisdictions).

Throughout the day we try to pickup as we go along, but naturally things tend toward disorder. So, it is a constant training process with "quick clean" times throughout the day. At 9:00AM, the older children help their buddies with their studies in phonics, math, violin & piano (J-O-Y- Jesus first, Others second, & Yourself last!). Then the older children start their music & individual studies - Math, English, Spelling & Typing.

We break for lunch around 12PM. Often one of the older children help prepare lunch & we all help cleanup. After lunch we work to finish individual studies.

Around 1:30PM the little ones go down for naps (4 & under). Momma & older children gather around the table at 2:00PM for Wisdom Booklet group studies - science, history, law, medicine - part of our ATIA curriculm. We work on one subject until we complete the study. We also review & memorize scripture, hymns & operational definitions of character qualities. The children especially enjoy this because they make up motions to help with memorization.

At 4:00PM, we break from group study to complete individual studies, otherwise this is free time. Dinner is scheduled for 5:00PM. Some of the older girls prepare dinner & everyone helps cleanup. We do another "quick clean" of the house after dinner & then have free time. Some may still be finishing up music, seeing we have to take turns on the pianos with 11 students! 8PM is snack time. Then we start getting ready for bed (baths, brush teeth, pick out clothes for the next day).

9:00PM is Bible time with Daddy. This is probably our favorite time of day. Daddy reads the Bible & we discuss the passage together. We talk about the day & bring out points of how to apply what we have learned. We enjoy making up skits & acting out examples of right responses & wrong responses. Often our little ones will fall asleep as Daddy begins Bible time, still they love to be with us at this special time. Bedtime falls around 10:00PM.

We have a master schedule of each family member's responsibilities displayed on our kitchen wall. This idea came from the Maxwell's, "Managers of Their Homes". For each month, we also have individual daily checklists which cover schoolwork, chores, music lessons, & personal hygiene. These were designed by Daddy so we could see at a glance how each child is doing. These checklists enable us to keep our children accountable & also reward them accordingly.

We have goals, but then we have reality! We are learning to practice flexibility -Not setting our affections on ideas or plans which could be changed by God or others! Sometimes we have "Daddy Days" when Daddy overrides the schedule and takes the children out for family time, a field trip or a service project. We try to make each day fun. Everyday is an exciting adventure!

Quote from Duggar website was here.

How sexist that only the older GIRLS are expected to make dinner.

They have to help clean up after meals?! Somebody call the authorities!

Does it really need to be spelled out for you? Okay, then:

1. You questioned how Meow knew the older children were raising the younger children?

2. I posted a quote from the family's website, bolding (for ease of reading) sentences that reference the older children being required to help in the rearing of the younger children.

3. You facetiously infer that someone (me?) is saying having children help clean up dishes is weird/odd/outrageous/shocking.


Here's you:













Here's the point:


And just so you understand that, it means you've missed it (the point) completely.


Perhaps folding, washing, etc. for your younger siblings gave you a good work ethic, but it doesn't seem to have helped you with reading comprehension.

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[Edited 3/3/10 8:16am]

And the insults just keep coming. Who's bitchy?

Most people grow up having to help out and do chores. I don't think anyone is saying that isn't the way children should be raised.

I've only seen the show a couple of times and from the little that I did see, this is not about kids just helping out and doing chores, the older kids are simply raising the younger ones. It's not comparable to the average family at all. These kids are flat our scheduled from dawn to dusk. I agree with structure in a child life but in my opinion and again from what I saw, it's a shitty way to grow up...and pair that with their fucked up religious beliefs and I think the parents are total morons.

"carbon footprint"

that's my only issue with it. it's totally irresponsible in the face of overpopulation

I think the oldest kid is already married with a baby. Not sure how old he is though. On their website they were talking about how they are excited to be grandparents and parents again (b/c the mom was preggers around the same time as the d.i.l. I wonder how many babies the d.i.l. are expected to pop out?

The other thing to think about is, like you pointed out, these childrens' entire day is scheduled from 8am until 10pm and they only hang out with each other. They are home-schooled, practice music at home, etc. I didn't see anything about them having activities outside their home. I imagine their lives are fairly sheltered, I wonder how they'll "cope" if any of them ever decide to try it in the "real world". (You know, kind of like how the Amish have that one year where they can do all sorts of hedonistic, un-Amish things... )

That's not the word I'd use.

that's my only issue with it. it's totally irresponsible in the face of overpopulation

Is there really an overpopulation problem or have we not figured out how to survive and thrive in certain areas of the planet? I mean people die just as quickly as people are born. It seems we are mostly a wasteful species not an overpopulated one. If we learned how to conserve and develop better recycling methods and energy sources for the areas we habitate, then the number of live births wouldn't be that much of an issue. Heck, there are more birds and rodents than there are people but we aren't trying to minimize their populations.