What Should I Tell My Siblings To Get Them To Work Harder? Practical Tips For Older Siblings And Caregivers
The kitchen clock ticked 9:37 last Tuesday when my 16-year-old Lila slouched against the fridge, still holding her phone, and asked me the question I’d heard once myself, 22 years ago, when I was the oldest sibling stuck herding two younger kids through homework and chores. “Mom, what do I actually say to Mia and Jax to get them to work harder? They’ve been on TikTok for two hours, their science project is due Friday, and yelling that they’re gonna fail doesn’t do anything. I just end up mad and they still don’t start.”
I wiped crumbs of peanut butter off the counter, nudged a stray kids’ sock off the baseboard with my foot, and thought back to when I was in her shoes. I grew up the oldest of three, and my mom always left me in charge when she worked late shifts at the hospital. I’d yell at my brother and sister that they were lazy, that they’d never get anywhere if they didn’t work harder, and they’d just lock the door to our shared bedroom and ignore me. By the time our mom got home, I’d be in tears and they hadn’t touched a single assignment. I knew what didn’t work, but it took a lot of trial and error to figure out what did.
Lila had already tried my old go-to last week, when Jax refused to study for his algebra test. She’d stood over the couch where he was scrolling Fortnite clips and said, “Why can’t you just work harder? You’re gonna flunk and have to retake this over summer break.” Jax just turned his headphones up louder, didn’t say a word to her for the rest of the night, and failed the quiz anyway. That’s the thing no one tells you when you’re an older sibling nagging younger ones: calling someone lazy or demanding they “work harder” never works. It just makes them shut down, because most of the time, they’re not procrastinating because they don’t care. They’re overwhelmed, or stuck, or embarrassed that they don’t know how to start, and yelling just shoves that embarrassment deeper.
I told Lila to try one small change first: stop talking about working harder at all, and just ask for the tiny next step. Instead of saying “you need to finish your whole project tonight,” say “can we just get all your supplies out onto the dining room table? That only takes two minutes, and then you can go back to TikTok if you really want.” I remembered this trick from when I taught middle school, before I had kids of my own: the hardest part of any big task is starting it. If you can get someone to cross the first tiny threshold, half the battle is done.
Lila tried it that night with Mia, 13, who’d been convinced her entire project was terrible and there was no point in starting. When Lila said they’d just trace the three diagrams for her ecosystem display, that was it, Mia put her phone down. Twenty minutes later, they’d traced and cut out all the diagrams, and Mia was digging through the junk drawer for glitter to glue on her lake drawing. She still took a 15 minute TikTok break halfway through, but she got more done that night than she had all week.
The second thing I told Lila to say was to stop guessing why they weren’t working, and just ask. Instead of “why are you so lazy and unmotivated?” say “I notice you’ve been sitting here for an hour and haven’t started. That feels really overwhelming, doesn’t it? What part is bugging you?” Again, this works because most procrastination isn’t laziness. Jax had been avoiding his algebra practice for three days because he’d missed the lesson on slope when he was out with a cold, and he was too embarrassed to tell anyone he didn’t get it. When Lila asked him what was hard instead of calling him lazy, he admitted it right away. They watched a five minute YouTube explanation together after dinner, and he did six practice problems before bed.
The last thing I told Lila was that she didn’t have to carry the whole weight. So many older siblings feel responsible for their younger brothers and sisters, especially when parents are busy working or out of the house. It’s okay to set a line, I told her. You can say “I’ll help you get started, and I’ll answer any questions you have, but I’m not gonna stress about your grade more than you do. This is your project, your test, your grade to deal with.” Lila used to stay up until 11 cutting out display boards for Mia because she didn’t want her little sister to get a bad grade, and it left her resenting both kids and falling behind on her own homework. Now, after she helps them start, she goes back to her room to do her own work, and if they don’t finish, they deal with the consequence at school. It’s not her job to be their parent.
It’s not perfect, of course. Last night, Jax still spent more time playing games than working on his project, and Mia forgot her display board at a friend’s house this morning on the way to school. Lila texted me an eye-roll emoji from the high school parking lot this afternoon, saying she still gets frustrated when they don’t care as much as she does. But the screaming matches that used to happen every Sunday night before school are gone. Last week, Jax even asked Lila for help with his homework before I had to nag him.
Some days it still feels like we’re all just figuring it out as we go. There’s no magic line that will make every sibling suddenly buckle down and work as hard as you want them to. But swapping out “why can’t you work harder” for these few small lines has made a bigger difference than any lecture I’ve ever given as a mom, or any yell I ever gave as an older sibling. Things are calmer, the kids are talking more instead of shutting down, and even on the hard days, that’s enough for right now.
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