“Money does not grow on trees” might be the perfect lesson for life to teach your children. However, this lesson is not quite as easy to teach, as it is to say. It takes years of setting rules, reasoning out with your kids, and helping to practically implement money management skills, before you can safely hand over a stash of notes to your teens, knowing that they will be in safe hands. No age is too early to begin imparting these valuable skills to your little ones, and you can start with children as young as two.

The following tips should help you get your way around bringing out the smart shopper in your child, but remember that you will needs lots of patience and perseverance to actually achieve your goal.

• Start giving your child a weekly allowance: You can follow the thumb-rule of a dollar multiplied by your child’s age, per week to decide the amount of allowance that is suitable for your child.
• Teach them how to divide their money into different jars: Help your child to divide his/her money into different jars, labelled ‘charity’, ‘quick cash’, ‘middle-term goals’, and ‘long-term goals’, or anything else you can think of.
• Involve them in the grocery shopping experience: Right from making a shopping list to sticking to it at the grocery store, and looking out for the best prices, grocery shopping is one of the best ways to teach your child how to manage money.
• Be a good role model: It’s simple- your child will mimic your money-spending habits; splurge and he’ll splurge, save and he’ll save!
• Inculcate the reward feeling of a hard-won goal: Even if you can afford something that your child really wants, do not buy it right when she asks for it. Let your child anticipate the reward, so that she can value it when she finally gets it.
• Play board games that involve money: Board games that involve fake money, like monopoly, are a great way to make your child learn the importance of saving, and get a feeling of handling money.
• Let them take charge occasionally: Get your child involved in processes like planning a vacation, letting them do the research, make bookings, and take important decisions. This will instil in them the much-needed confidence to be world-ready.
• Open for them an account of their own: Opening a savings account for your child is a great way to make them feel responsible and secure, and also help them save a big amount of money without spending needlessly.

We at Boys and Girls Club of Central Texas, run a wide number of grouped and individual recreational, educational and social programs for the overall development of your kids. One such program is the ‘Money Matters’ program which promotes financial responsibility and independence among the kids. It teaches them managing their budget and saving and investing the right way.

To know more about this program or to enrol your kid in the same, kindly visit us at the Boys and Girls Club of Central Texas at 304 W Ave B, TX- 76541. You can also contact Ms. Carol Dunn (Administrative assistant) at 254-699-5808, Ext: 102.

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