by Amanda van der Gulik
Does your child or teen use you like their very own personal ATM bank machine? Don’t worry, you’re not alone. Most children and teens today think money is a free gift that they are entitled to. It’s also what’s causing the major money stresses facing young adults today.
Kids and teens are growing up with no appreciation of money, no acknowledgement of the work involved in earning money. So many parents feel that they suffered financially as kids, with little of their own money, that they are now over-indulging our youth with easy-access to ‘free money’. Money that their parent’s work hard for but which the child or teen has no idea that that money had to be worked for.
It’s amazing how many young children today honestly believe that money comes freely out of a wall, or bank machine. They really think that all mommy and daddy have to do to get money is go to one of those money machines, punch in a secret code and voila…free money comes out!
What’s even worse is that many of our teens today truly believe that the credit cards they are being given also give them immediate access to free money. They just don’t see that it’s not their money…and that they will have to not only pay back that money but they’ll have to pay a ridiculously high interest rate for that money they borrowed! Not until it’s too late that is! YIKES!!!
But what can you do? How can you teach your child or teen how to value money? How to appreciate the hard work involved in acquiring that money? Besides, as their parents aren’t we supposed to give them money for the things they want?
Those are all very fair questions. Let me quickly address the last one first and then I’ll share a personal story with you to give you an easy way to help your child finally find value in each dollar and no longer treat you like their personal money machine.
No, I honestly don’t believe that we are supposed to give our children and teenagers money for free. How on earth will they ever learn to value it if they never have to put any effort in to get it? Think about it this way…what if as a 16 year old teenager you had been given a car for your birthday. You would have been thrilled right? But would you have treated it with the same care and consideration it deserved as you would have if you had earned the money to buy it all yourself?
Of course not!
Okay, so now let me share my own personal story with you on how I was able, with the help of my mother, instill the best lesson on the value of money in my little girl, Xanthe, at a very young age….and then I’ll give you some ideas on how you can use my story to help teach your child or teen how to truly appreciate money so that they will be successful financially for life and will no longer treat you like their own personal bank machine.
Here’s what happened and it wasn’t intentional, it just seemed to work out this way:
A few years ago, when my daughter, Xanthe, was just 5 years old, we were visiting my mother. My mother was cramming plastic bags into her bag cupboard very unsuccessfully. In exasperation she turned to my little girl and offered her then and there on the spot a paid job to help folder her bags into tiny little triangles so they would take up much less space in her cupboard and she wouldn’t have to continue to fight with the cupboard door to close it.
You see my mother had been complaining to her best friend about her plastic bag cupboard a few days earlier and her friend had shown her a really cool way to fold up plastic bags so that they wouldn’t take up so much space. It was an awesome idea but my mother just hadn’t had the time to do them all. The prospect of it had quite honestly been a little overwhelming for her.
Then on the day we were visiting, the cupboard door just refused to close anymore. It was simply too full! That’s when she turned to my little girl and offered her the job.
Xanthe was thrilled to get a job where she could make some of her own money. She wanted to buy some fun toys at the local dollar store but didn’t have any of her own money yet to do that. Being a clever girl, she saw the opportunity and jumped on it!
My mother paid her one penny for every bag she folded. After learning how to fold the bags, she began to get a knack for it and was easily folding one bag every minute, earning herself a whopping 60 cents per hour. Her little brother, Quinn was interested in this venture as well so Xanthe hired him on and paid him one penny for every 3 bags he folded, just like a mini-franchisee. (But I’ll save that story for another day.)
So how did this teach Xanthe the value of money? Well, it was really what happened next that literally made ‘the penny drop’, so to speak, in her mind. This is what happened next:
The next day was the local fall fair and we took Xanthe and Quinn to the fair to have a fun day out with our family. At the age of 5 Xanthe was starting to read and really enjoyed trying to read all the signs on display. She noticed that the Ferris Wheel had a sign that read, “3 tokens”.
“Mommy what does that mean?” she asked me.
“It means that to ride that you need to have 3 tokens to give the nice gentleman.” I replied.
“Can we get 3 tokens please? I want to go on the Ferris Wheel with you and Quinn.” She said excitedly.
“Yes, we can do that sweetheart but first we have to buy the tokens over by that token booth.” I told her.
“How much are they?” she asked. Now that she was earning her own money she was much more interested in knowing about that stuff.
“Each token is a dollar.” I told her.
“What’s a dollar Mommy?” she asked. She knew what a penny was but didn’t yet know what a dollar was.
So I told her, “A dollar is 100 pennies.”
“WOW! That’s a lot of pennies!” Her mouth actually dropped open. She knew how to count to 100 and she knew it took a really long time to count all the way up to 100. She continued, “but Mommy don’t we need 3 tokens for the ride?”
“Yes we do.” I agreed.
“How many pennies is that then?” she asked.
“Well, sweetheart, that’s 100 pennies, 3 times.” I replied.
“WOW! That’s a really lot of pennies!” She was actually stunned.
I took her and Quinn on the ride and while we were riding we counted out how long it would have taken her to earn 300 pennies to go on the ride if she had to pay it herself. She took about one minute to fold each bag, and she would have had to fold 300 bags to go on that ride if she had bought it herself. So that would have meant that she would have had to fold bags for 5 hours just to go on one ride!
It was an incredible lesson for her and has stuck with her all these years. That day she learned how to put the work and the money together.
So how can you use my daughter’s experience to help your child or teen really appreciate money? Well, you can relate our story to begin with and see if that will make ‘the penny drop’ as well but I really recommend you think outside of the box, and see if you can come up with a way to give your child the opportunity to earn their own money and then have them save up to purchase something they really want.
When they can experience the earning of the money, the waiting and saving, and then finally feel the excitement of the achieving of the goal they set up for themselves, then you will find that your child will finally get to truly understand the real value of money…and no longer take you for granted as their personal free money machine!
Hope you found this article helpful. Thank-you for making your child’s financial education a top priority, as a fellow home-schooling mom, I encourage you to take these money lessons and incorporate them into your child’s curriculum. All of our children can succeed financially with just a little consistent guidance and I’m here to help you.
Cheers…Amanda van der Gulik…Excited Life Enthusiast! ;o)
Best-selling author, Amanda van der Gulik has been homeschooling her own two children for over 11 years and is the founder of www.TeachingChildrenAboutMoney.com. Visit Amanda’s site today to grab your FREE copy of her eBook, “50 Money Making Ideas for Kids and Teens” or her “The 6 Magical Piggy Banks” cartoon.
Does your child or teen use you like their very own personal ATM bank machine? Don’t worry, you’re not alone. Most children and teens today think money is a free gift that they are entitled to. It’s also what’s causing the major money stresses facing young adults today.
Kids and teens are growing up with no appreciation of money, no acknowledgement of the work involved in earning money. So many parents feel that they suffered financially as kids, with little of their own money, that they are now over-indulging our youth with easy-access to ‘free money’. Money that their parent’s work hard for but which the child or teen has no idea that that money had to be worked for.
It’s amazing how many young children today honestly believe that money comes freely out of a wall, or bank machine. They really think that all mommy and daddy have to do to get money is go to one of those money machines, punch in a secret code and voila…free money comes out!
What’s even worse is that many of our teens today truly believe that the credit cards they are being given also give them immediate access to free money. They just don’t see that it’s not their money…and that they will have to not only pay back that money but they’ll have to pay a ridiculously high interest rate for that money they borrowed! Not until it’s too late that is! YIKES!!!
But what can you do? How can you teach your child or teen how to value money? How to appreciate the hard work involved in acquiring that money? Besides, as their parents aren’t we supposed to give them money for the things they want?
Those are all very fair questions. Let me quickly address the last one first and then I’ll share a personal story with you to give you an easy way to help your child finally find value in each dollar and no longer treat you like their personal money machine.
No, I honestly don’t believe that we are supposed to give our children and teenagers money for free. How on earth will they ever learn to value it if they never have to put any effort in to get it? Think about it this way…what if as a 16 year old teenager you had been given a car for your birthday. You would have been thrilled right? But would you have treated it with the same care and consideration it deserved as you would have if you had earned the money to buy it all yourself?
Of course not!
Okay, so now let me share my own personal story with you on how I was able, with the help of my mother, instill the best lesson on the value of money in my little girl, Xanthe, at a very young age….and then I’ll give you some ideas on how you can use my story to help teach your child or teen how to truly appreciate money so that they will be successful financially for life and will no longer treat you like their own personal bank machine.
Here’s what happened and it wasn’t intentional, it just seemed to work out this way:
A few years ago, when my daughter, Xanthe, was just 5 years old, we were visiting my mother. My mother was cramming plastic bags into her bag cupboard very unsuccessfully. In exasperation she turned to my little girl and offered her then and there on the spot a paid job to help folder her bags into tiny little triangles so they would take up much less space in her cupboard and she wouldn’t have to continue to fight with the cupboard door to close it.
You see my mother had been complaining to her best friend about her plastic bag cupboard a few days earlier and her friend had shown her a really cool way to fold up plastic bags so that they wouldn’t take up so much space. It was an awesome idea but my mother just hadn’t had the time to do them all. The prospect of it had quite honestly been a little overwhelming for her.
Then on the day we were visiting, the cupboard door just refused to close anymore. It was simply too full! That’s when she turned to my little girl and offered her the job.
Xanthe was thrilled to get a job where she could make some of her own money. She wanted to buy some fun toys at the local dollar store but didn’t have any of her own money yet to do that. Being a clever girl, she saw the opportunity and jumped on it!
My mother paid her one penny for every bag she folded. After learning how to fold the bags, she began to get a knack for it and was easily folding one bag every minute, earning herself a whopping 60 cents per hour. Her little brother, Quinn was interested in this venture as well so Xanthe hired him on and paid him one penny for every 3 bags he folded, just like a mini-franchisee. (But I’ll save that story for another day.)
So how did this teach Xanthe the value of money? Well, it was really what happened next that literally made ‘the penny drop’, so to speak, in her mind. This is what happened next:
The next day was the local fall fair and we took Xanthe and Quinn to the fair to have a fun day out with our family. At the age of 5 Xanthe was starting to read and really enjoyed trying to read all the signs on display. She noticed that the Ferris Wheel had a sign that read, “3 tokens”.
“Mommy what does that mean?” she asked me.
“It means that to ride that you need to have 3 tokens to give the nice gentleman.” I replied.
“Can we get 3 tokens please? I want to go on the Ferris Wheel with you and Quinn.” She said excitedly.
“Yes, we can do that sweetheart but first we have to buy the tokens over by that token booth.” I told her.
“How much are they?” she asked. Now that she was earning her own money she was much more interested in knowing about that stuff.
“Each token is a dollar.” I told her.
“What’s a dollar Mommy?” she asked. She knew what a penny was but didn’t yet know what a dollar was.
So I told her, “A dollar is 100 pennies.”
“WOW! That’s a lot of pennies!” Her mouth actually dropped open. She knew how to count to 100 and she knew it took a really long time to count all the way up to 100. She continued, “but Mommy don’t we need 3 tokens for the ride?”
“Yes we do.” I agreed.
“How many pennies is that then?” she asked.
“Well, sweetheart, that’s 100 pennies, 3 times.” I replied.
“WOW! That’s a really lot of pennies!” She was actually stunned.
I took her and Quinn on the ride and while we were riding we counted out how long it would have taken her to earn 300 pennies to go on the ride if she had to pay it herself. She took about one minute to fold each bag, and she would have had to fold 300 bags to go on that ride if she had bought it herself. So that would have meant that she would have had to fold bags for 5 hours just to go on one ride!
It was an incredible lesson for her and has stuck with her all these years. That day she learned how to put the work and the money together.
So how can you use my daughter’s experience to help your child or teen really appreciate money? Well, you can relate our story to begin with and see if that will make ‘the penny drop’ as well but I really recommend you think outside of the box, and see if you can come up with a way to give your child the opportunity to earn their own money and then have them save up to purchase something they really want.
When they can experience the earning of the money, the waiting and saving, and then finally feel the excitement of the achieving of the goal they set up for themselves, then you will find that your child will finally get to truly understand the real value of money…and no longer take you for granted as their personal free money machine!
Hope you found this article helpful. Thank-you for making your child’s financial education a top priority, as a fellow home-schooling mom, I encourage you to take these money lessons and incorporate them into your child’s curriculum. All of our children can succeed financially with just a little consistent guidance and I’m here to help you.
Cheers…Amanda van der Gulik…Excited Life Enthusiast! ;o)
Best-selling author, Amanda van der Gulik has been homeschooling her own two children for over 11 years and is the founder of www.TeachingChildrenAboutMoney.com. Visit Amanda’s site today to grab your FREE copy of her eBook, “50 Money Making Ideas for Kids and Teens” or her “The 6 Magical Piggy Banks” cartoon.
