Home Cleaning and Arrangement

Lessons

Senior 3 · Home Science

Home Cleaning and Arrangement

4 lessons

Lesson 2 of 4

Home cleaning procedures

25 min

Let's begin

Watch a room attendant prepare a hotel room in Kigali and you will notice that the order never changes: windows open, rubbish out, bed stripped, dusting from the top of the wardrobe down to the skirting board, and the floor last, mopped backwards out of the door. Hotels write these steps down as a procedure because the order is what makes cleaning fast and thorough. Done in the wrong order, the work undoes itself: dust shaken from a shelf lands on a floor you have just mopped.

This lesson turns that professional habit into rules you can use in any home, sets out how often each job should be done, and covers the safety rules for cleaning products that you must never break.

Definition

Cleaning procedure: a fixed set of steps, in a fixed order, for cleaning a room or an item.

Routine (daily) cleaning: quick jobs done every day to stop dirt building up, such as washing up and sweeping. Weekly cleaning: more thorough jobs done once a week, such as dusting all furniture and changing bed linen. Periodic (deep) cleaning: jobs done every month, term or year, such as washing curtains and cleaning behind furniture.

Cross-contamination: carrying germs from a dirty area to a clean one, for example on a cloth used first on a toilet and then on a basin.

Six rules for any room

Prepare. Open windows for fresh air. Put on an apron and gloves. Gather your tools in a bucket or basket so you do not keep leaving the room. Pick up clutter before you clean: you cannot clean a surface you cannot reach.
Top to bottom. Dust falls, so start high (cobwebs, light fittings, top of the wardrobe) and finish with the floor.
Dry before wet. Dust and sweep before you mop or wipe. Water on top of dust makes mud.
Clean to dirty. Wash the basin before the toilet, and the cups before the cooking pots. Keep separate cloths for the toilet and never use them anywhere else.
Far side to the door. Work from the corner farthest from the door towards the door, so you never walk on a wet floor or across a part you have finished (Figure 2).
Finish properly. Put furniture back, wash and dry your cloths and mop, rinse buckets, take off gloves and wash your hands.

Mopping with two buckets

A single bucket quickly becomes dirty water that spreads dirt around. With two buckets, one holds clean water and detergent and the other holds rinse water. Dip the mop in the detergent water, mop a lane, rinse and wring the mop in the second bucket, then dip it again. Change the rinse water as soon as it turns grey.

How often? A cleaning schedule

Room	Daily	Weekly	Periodic (monthly or termly)
Bedroom	air the room, make the bed, hang up clothes, sweep	change bed linen, dust furniture, mop, shake mats	air and turn the mattress, wash curtains, clean windows, sort the wardrobe
Sitting room	tidy, straighten cushions, sweep, empty the bin	dust, mop, wipe switches and door handles, brush upholstery	wash curtains and cushion covers, move furniture and clean underneath
Kitchen	wash dishes, wipe worktops and stove, sweep and mop, empty the bin	clean the fridge, wipe cupboard doors, scrub the bin	empty and wipe cupboards, clean behind the cooker, wash the walls
Bathroom and toilet	clean toilet bowl and seat, wipe basin and taps, empty the bin	scrub shower and tiles, wash bath mats, mop with disinfectant	descale taps and shower head, scrub grout, clear drains

Procedure: cleaning a toilet

Put on gloves. Close the lid and flush.
Squirt toilet cleaner under the rim and leave it for the contact time on the label.
Meanwhile, wipe the outside with the toilet cloth, from cleanest to dirtiest: top of the cistern, flush handle, lid, both sides of the seat, outside of the bowl, and last the base and floor around it.
Scrub inside the bowl with the toilet brush, especially under the rim, then flush.
Rinse the brush in the flushing water and stand it to drip dry. Wash the toilet cloth separately, take off the gloves and wash your hands with soap.

GoCleanCo: how to clean a room "top to bottom, left to right". Notice how the cleaner works round the room in one direction so that no area is missed or cleaned twice, and leaves the floor until last.

Warning

Cleaning products: rules you must never break

Never mix bleach with ammonia (found in some glass and multi-surface cleaners): the mixture gives off chloramine gases that damage the lungs.
Never mix bleach with acids such as vinegar, lemon juice or most toilet and descaling cleaners: the mixture releases chlorine gas.
Use one product at a time, and rinse with water before using a different one. Two toilet cleaners poured into one bowl is exactly the mistake that causes poisoning at home.
Read the label, wear gloves, and keep windows open.
Keep products in their original, labelled containers, closed and locked away from children. Never pour them into drink bottles.
Unplug an appliance before wiping it, and never touch switches with wet hands.

Important

First aid for cleaning-product accidents

Splash in the eye: rinse at once with plenty of clean running water for 10 to 20 minutes, holding the eyelids open and tilting the head so the water runs away from the other eye. Then get medical help.
On the skin: take off soaked clothing and rinse the skin with plenty of running water.
Fumes breathed in: move the person into fresh air at once, and get help if they cough, wheeze or feel dizzy.
Swallowed: do not make the person vomit. Rinse the mouth with water, call the SAMU ambulance on 912 or go to the nearest health centre, and take the product container with you.

The eye advice is from the European Resuscitation Council (ERC) First Aid guidelines of 2021. The ERC's 2025 First Aid guidelines did not review chemical eye injuries again, so the 2021 advice is the most recent from the ERC.

Worked example

Worked example 1: put the jobs in order. Habimana must clean a sitting room. His list, in no order: mop the floor; dust the shelves; open the windows; wipe the window sills; sweep; take out the cups and plates; dust the ceiling fan.

Preparation first: open the windows; take out the cups and plates (clear clutter).
Dry jobs from top to bottom: dust the ceiling fan; dust the shelves; wipe the window sills (damp wipe of a high surface, done before the floor).
Floor, dry before wet: sweep, then mop from the far corner towards the door.
Order: windows, cups, ceiling fan, shelves, sills, sweep, mop.

Worked example

Worked example 2: how much detergent? A floor cleaner's label says: add 30 mL to 5 litres of water. Keza's bucket holds 8 litres. How much cleaner should she add?

The dose is proportional to the volume of water.
$\text{dose} = 30\,\mathrm{mL} \times \frac{8\,\mathrm{L}}{5\,\mathrm{L}} = 48\,\mathrm{mL}$
Answer: 48 mL. Adding more does not clean better: extra detergent leaves a sticky film that attracts dirt, and it wastes money.

Tip

Memory hook: "Air, high, dry, wet, out." Air the room, start high, do the dry jobs, then the wet job, and finish at the way out.

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Practice

Define a cleaning procedure, and explain the difference between daily and periodic cleaning.
Give two reasons why the floor is cleaned last.
Give one daily, one weekly and one periodic job for a kitchen.
Explain why a cleaner should use a different cloth for the toilet and the basin.
A label says: dilute 25 mL in 5 litres. How much is needed for a 3-litre bucket?
Uwase wants a "stronger" toilet cleaner, so she plans to pour bleach into the bowl together with a vinegar-based descaler. Explain the danger and tell her what to do instead.
Your brother mops a corridor starting at the door and working towards the far end. Evaluate his method and suggest an improvement.

Show answersHide answers

A fixed set of steps in a fixed order for cleaning a room or item. Daily cleaning is quick, done every day to stop dirt building up; periodic cleaning is thorough work done monthly, termly or yearly, such as washing curtains.
Dust and dirt from higher surfaces fall onto it; and if you mopped first you would have to walk on the wet floor while doing the other jobs.
For example: daily, wash dishes or wipe the worktops; weekly, clean the fridge or scrub the bin; periodic, empty and wipe the cupboards or clean behind the cooker.
To avoid cross-contamination: germs from the toilet would be carried to the basin, where people wash their hands and faces.
$25 \times \frac{3}{5} = 15$ mL.
Vinegar is an acid; mixed with bleach it releases chlorine gas, which harms the eyes and lungs, especially in a small toilet room. She should use one product, follow the label, rinse with water, and use the other product only on a different day or after rinsing.
Poor: he walks over the floor he has just mopped, leaving footprints and risking a fall. He should start at the far end and mop backwards towards the door, then put out a wet-floor sign.

Sources and credits

Lesson text, Figure 2, schedule, worked examples and practice: written by Ganzaa.
First aid for chemical splashes: European Resuscitation Council Guidelines 2021: First aid, Zideman D.A. et al., Resuscitation 161 (2021); and European Resuscitation Council Guidelines 2025: First Aid, Djärv T. et al., Resuscitation 215 (2025). Advice summarised in Ganzaa's own words.
Photo: Wet floor caution sign, Kurt Kaiser, Wikimedia Commons, CC0.
Video: How to Properly Clean a Room | Top to Bottom, Left to Right, GoCleanCo, embedded from YouTube.

1Six rules for any room

2Mopping with two buckets

3How often? A cleaning schedule

4Procedure: cleaning a toilet

Six rules for any room

Mopping with two buckets

How often? A cleaning schedule

Procedure: cleaning a toilet