Teaching Laundry Skills: Free Visuals and Resources to Help
Teaching laundry skills can feel very overwhelming because there are so many steps to washing, drying, and folding. Plus there are so many different executive function and sensory components that go into teaching laundry skills.
Let me help you today by giving you tips and free resources to help you with teaching laundry skills.
Why Teaching Laundry Skills are Important
Teaching laundry skills is important because it helps individuals develop essential life skills that will enable them to maintain a clean and organized home environment. Additionally, learning how to do laundry can also save money by preventing damage to clothing and reducing reliance on professional cleaning services. Finally, laundry skills can help promote self-sufficiency and independence, which can lead to increased confidence and improved quality of life.
The Benefits of Teaching Laundry Skills
Teaching laundry skills can have numerous benefits, including promoting self-sufficiency and independence, saving money by avoiding costly laundry services, reducing environmental impact by using energy-efficient appliances and techniques, and improving overall cleanliness and hygiene. Additionally, learning these skills can be empowering and provide a sense of accomplishment.
Doing the Laundry is a Complex Task to Learn
Learning laundry skills involves a lot of steps and understanding.
These are all of the skill areas involved in doing the laundry:
Fine motor skills such as hand strength and coordination to turn the dial, push buttons, or pour laundry soap.
Gross motor skills like balance, coordination, strength, range of motion to sort the clothes, carry the laundry basket, and putting the clothes in and out of the washer and dryer.
Visual motor and visual perceptual skills to look and scan the washer for the correct dial and buttons, putting the correct laundry soap in the washer, or visually scanning the clothes for washing directions.
Sensory skills which could include the feeling and textures of the clothing dry and wet, the smell of the laundry soap, the heat of the dryer, and the ability to look down and grab the clothes in the washer and dryer.
Executive function and cognitive skills: This could include keeping their attention to task, switching between tasks from what they were doing before needing to do laundry, noticing that they need to do the laundry, the steps to turning the washer and dryer off, following direction, keeping themselves safe while doing the laundry, and being able to problem solve if something goes wrong.
Tips for Teaching Laundry Skills
Here are some general tips and strategies you can use when teaching laundry skills.
- Use stickers or markers to mark frequently used settings such as the location on the dial of the washing machine or dryer to help with setting the machine.
- Use a marker or sticker to place a line where to pour the liquid soap or on the scoop with dry laundry soap so they know how much to put into the scooper. Otherwise you can use laundry pods to help with this step as well.
- Another general tip is if they are struggling with some of the sensory aspects when it comes to doing laundry then you could check out the book Seeing Your Home and Community with Sensory Eyes by Victoria Wood. It is a great resource to problem solve and find solutions to everyday daily life skills.
How to Teach the Laundry Skills
- Model or show them how to do the steps.
- Break the Steps Down or use Task Analysis to Help Teach the Steps.
- Use Backwards or Forwards Chaining to teach the steps.
- Use Social Stories to Talk about the Steps and why we need to wash our clothes.
- Use video modeling to show the steps of doing the laundry.
- Use a visual schedule to help them understand when they may need to do the laundry.
- Use a picture board to show what steps are done within the skill of doing the laundry.
- Use visual reminders or timers to help remind when to do the laundry or to switch between the tasks.
- Try using laundry apps to help show the steps.
Get your Free Visuals to help with Teaching Laundry Skills
Download our FREE Laundry Skills Printable that contains the steps to complete the laundry in a checklist format, visual sequencing cards with pictures and words, teaching tips, and activity ideas!
Just enter your best email address below and you will be sent the free laundry skills visuals.
Tips to Help with Sorting Clothes
You could have two separate laundry baskets for one with colored clothes and the other one has white clothes.
You could put a picture of the colored clothes on one basket and the white clothes on the other.
Teach them how to check the label on the clothing to make sure it can be washed, otherwise make sure to only by clothing that can be washed and doesn’t need to be dry cleaned.
Tips to Help with Washing Skills
Make sure to understand what washing settings to use on the washing machine.
Make sure to check pockets before putting things into the washer.
You could set a visual timer to help them understand when the washing machine will be done.
Make sure to use laundry soap that they can easily use and the smell doesn’t bother them.
Tips to Help with Drying Clothes
Show them how to put the clothes into the dryer and mark on the dial where they need to set the dial.
Show them how to clean the lint screen.
Tips to Help with Folding Clothes
A great tool to help with folding laundry is using a folding board. You can learn more about it here.
I also found this video model on YouTube showing you how to fold clothes.
Tips with Putting Clothes Away
When learning to put the clothes away you could have them just place the clothes into a basket and skip over the skill of folding or hanging up all together if that is too hard or time consuming for them. You could use plastic storage bins, laundry baskets, or cube storage to just have them sort out their shirts, pants, socks, underwear, shorts, etc. without needing to fold them or hang them up.
Teaching Laundry Skills
Teaching Laundry Skills can sometimes feel overwhelming because there are so many steps involved and there are some advanced skills with understanding how to take care of certain clothes, how to fold them and organize them, and how to get out certain stains. I wanted to help make this process a little easier to teach by making you a free printable with visuals to help teach each step. I hope that these visuals can be helpful to help you teach an important daily living skill. Laundry skills are an important part of our every day life and I hope these tips and resources can be helpful for you in your teaching journey.
Get your Free Visuals to help with Teaching Laundry Skills
Download our FREE Laundry Skills Printable that contains the steps to complete the laundry in a checklist format, visual sequencing cards with pictures and words, teaching tips, and activity ideas!
Just enter your email address below and you will be sent the free laundry skills visuals.
Additional Free Laundry Skills Resources
I also wanted to offer you some more free resources that I came across when searching Teachers Pay Teachers. You will have to create an account on their website, but it is free and they have tons of great teaching resources!
Household Chores Laundry Life Skills Unit by Check In with Mrs. G on Teachers Pay Teachers
DLS Doing the Laundry Workbook by Susan Traugh on Teachers Pay Teachers
Life Skills Laundry – When to wash? by Breia Franklin on Teachers Pay Teachers
Laundry Basics by Real World Life Skills on Teachers Pay Teachers
Free Apps to teach Laundry Skills
