April 2009 Article 1 | Article 2
5 Easy Tools for Speaking to Children About Finances
Picture yourself in the following scenes:
- You and your 4 year old are in the supermarket. You have a budget you promised yourself you would stick to, but your child begs you for a special item he has to have. It will put your budget over by $8.00. You say not today, you don’t have the money. He starts crying and throwing a temper tantrum. You buy the item to keep him from crying.
- Your teenager comes home excited about the senior class trip. The cost for the trip including transportation, hotel, admission to the amusement park and food allowance is $210.00. You want her to be able to go, but you fear losing your job within the next month and are saving everything you have.
Do these situations sound familiar? If so, you are certainly not alone. Today's financial environment has forced all of us to re-evaluate how we spend our money. Admittedly, the above scenarios are rather benign. Your situation may involve much larger issues such as college tuition or paying the mortgage. But sometimes it's the daily “little things” that add up and tax us the most. So how do we talk to our children now that the financial landscape has changed? The following list includes things to consider when approaching the discussion:
- Telling the truth.
This doesn't mean you need to tell your child every detail about your current financial status. However, our children are much more perceptive than we give them credit for. We may want to protect them from the truth if we're in financial trouble, but there are consequences when we deceive them. Often children will create stories for themselves regarding what's wrong that are much worse than the truth, and they may blame themselves for the difficulty. Being truthful about the situation in an age-appropriate manner can relieve your child's stress about the future. - Provide alternative options.
If your financial status has required you to limit opportunities for your child, offering another choice can help lessen the impact. For example, if you can no longer afford on-going dance or art classes, find some local township weekend workshops that you may be able to afford. - Find uninterrupted time to spend with your children.
Children of all ages value spending time with their parents. So often we believe spending money on our children is an expression of love for our children. Putting all our other priorities aside and placing all our attention on our children for even 30 minutes is an enormous gift that has no price tag. - Use compassion and empathy.
If your child appears angry about the changes that are happening due to less income, try seeing it from their perspective. Their lives have been impacted by the current crisis, and they understand what happened much less than we do. Using compassion doesn't mean it's okay for your child to have screaming fits, but chances are the situation will diffuse much quicker if you can validate their experience instead of insisting they not be angry. Let your child know you understand why they are angry, and that you wish things didn't have to change. - Empower your child to discover their own ability to raise money for things they want.
Surely this isn't going to cover some of the bigger items such as college, but it may help with the 2 scenarios in the beginning of the article. Even a 4 year old can earn money by helping around the house. Then the next time you go to the supermarket, they can buy the special items they want all by themselves! Older children can be supported to find jobs in the community or may be able to help provide the family with a service you might otherwise pay for.
We hope you find these tools helpful in opening a dialogue between you and your child. And remember, teaching children financial responsibility is an act of love, despite all the difficulty it may entail.
The Athena Connection: April 2009 Article 1 | Article 2