The Value of Money

Our bedroom is peppered with random numbers bearing the dollar or peso sign. We take it as a sign that the little one is slowly being aware of money and its value.


While there maybe a bad side of being money-aware so early on in childhood, I believe with guidance, it has its good points, too.


On Budget

I will be forever thankful that he is not one to throw tantrums. At toy stores, he will be content to push or pull you to where a certain toy caught his fancy-- but will not ask you to buy. His dialogues will range from:

• This is nice, mom
• I will buy this when I have money
• Mom, is this cheap?

Because budgeting is still hard for me, I am looking for ways to teach him that money is something that me and his dad work for, and is not something that comes to anyone easily.

But I don't want to deprive him totally-- so I have an imposed P20 budget for when we go to the mall and he wanted something -- most often at National Bookstore.


This exercise has taught him patience-- he scours the racks to find an item which will suit his budget. And the boy can be patient if needed. He has also learned that things can be pretty expensive... all the more reason to drive home our point that we shouldn't spend and spend but save instead.


Start Saving
 
So now, if he wants something, he things of it in terms of jars of money. He is always counting his savings (something he does almost every other day) because he wants to know how much more he needs to save (teka to save to be able to spend--may mali pa din ata hahaha).



For example:

After passing by Sofitel
Mom, I want to sleep there. How many jars (of money) do I need?


After seeing a for sale sign at one big house
Mom, can I buy a mansion? How many jars?





 At the most unlikely places

Another happy place for him to learn about money, among other things is the grocery. He'd look forward to this almost weekly chore with gusto, writing his grocery list ( I generally don't carry a grocery list with me because writing the grocery list stresses me out-teehee!) like this:

You can see what's important for my 5 year old here: Food!!!

So here, he's pretending to check his list and get the actual item to place inside his cart. Pretend because I don't see onions in his list.

For now, I'm so thankful that our jar is full, blessing -wise.