Don’t Miss the Chance to Teach Your Children
Soon our kids will be out of school for a couple of weeks. We should be looking forward to Christmas, winter fun and educating our kids. Yes, winter vacation is a great time to teach your children about money. Don’t miss this holiday break financial opportunity for parents
But why is this a good time? Actually, any time is a good time. But these two weeks that kids have off have some additional built-in advantages.
Spend Time Together
Parents often have vacation or additional time off around Christmas and New Years. With our busy lives, being at home at the same time as our kids doesn’t happen enough. Use this time wisely.
Giving Your Child a Teachable Gift
Have you thought about a gift that can help teach your child about money, or managing their finances? From stocking-stuffers to gifts of cash, there are almost endless gift ideas that provide openings to share about financial management or money.
Take Them Shopping
Bringing them with you to purchase gifts, either for your family or help them find gifts for their friends and relatives. These can be teachable moments. Making their money go further, staying within their “budget” and incorporating the value of comparison shopping can all be building blocks for financial learning.
If you are looking for gifts to give your kids, here are some examples you might consider. Keep in mind the possibilities are almost endless.
Under 5 Years Old
- Give them money, or play money. Have young children sort different types of money into piles by color and size.
- Toys tied into business, like a play store. Maybe you can find a toy cash register, and help them learn about the value of money and how commerce works.
- A Piggy Bank can be fun for them to receive and look at. You can also give them some money to start their savings.
- A Children’s book about money. There are so many good books you can find. Many popular book series have money teaching books, like The Cat In The Hat, The Berenstain Bears, Curious George, and more.
Pre-Teens
- How about old fashioned board games? These used to be the staple of great family times, especially when doing things outside was more difficult. Board games are still around today, and the choices to teach about money are extensive. Cashflow for Kids, Pay Day, and even the old standby Monopoly are good choices.
- What about getting them the gift of a savings account? Give them a check as a starter. Then take them down to your local credit union (like Mid Oregon), and open an account. This can be a great start to a solid financial life. Make it their account, with you as a joint owner. Of course, you don’t need to wait until they are in elementary school to open their savings. Each year you can bring them in with the money gifts they received to make their deposit.
- With those same money gifts, you can teach about spending, saving and giving at the same time. Urge them to save a portion of what they receive, and set aside some for what they want to buy. But what most parents forget is you can teach them about giving, too. Being generous or charitable is a part of healthy money management, too!
Teenagers
- Teach kids money management with a debit card. If you’ve already been teaching smart money management skills and your son or daughter has shown financial responsibility, a debit card/checking account from Mid Oregon Credit Union can be a great next step to teach kids money management.
Bring them to the credit union to open their checking account, and you can maintain some teaching influence (and control) with our Mid Oregon tool of CardNavSM by CO-OP. It gives real-time security and control over Mid Oregon debit cards through smartphones or tablets! It can use GPS to restrict transactions to businesses within a designated area. You can limit debit card use to specific merchant or purchase types. You can receive near real-time, in-app transaction alerts. and receive alerts when you’re getting close to any personal spending limits set. Visit MidOregon.com for information on downloading this free app.
- Games work for teenagers too. Monopoly is good for older kids (and adults), but there are many more.
- Books for adults can become good reading for older kids. The Rich Dad, Poor Dad series has a book for teens, and Dave Ramsey has many good materials for youth. These are just the tip of the iceberg.
- If you child has a smartphone or tablet, there are many apps which provide teaching on money. Do a search and you will find many app lists to help kids learn about money. Get a good recommendation and be sure you agree with how the apps deal with their subject.
This Is The Time
As you can see, there are many choices to help you teach your kids about money management. This is an ideal time to start of continue building that learning. Don’t hesitate to come into Mid Oregon to ask about resources, and help your child get started on a life of sound financial management!