Can a Website Teach Kids About Money (VIDEO).
Posted: September 20th, 2011 | Author: Joe | Filed under: Saving, Tips | Tags: Games, money, Teaching Children, Tips, video | 1 Comment »One thing that seems to be universally agreed upon is that if more people learned how to manage their money at a younger age, the country would be in a far better place as a whole, financially speaking.
How young is “young”, and is there such a thing as “too young” to learn about money?
I personally believe that there is no such thing as “too young”, which is why I wrote about games to teach children about money a while back. That post focuses on the toddler and elementary school age kids, but I don’t think you’re ever too old to learn about money either.
So that post was about role-playing style games to play with your children, but here’s a video about websites that can help your older children to learn money basics like budgeting and delayed gratification.
The video (above) profiles 10-year old Evan Lipset who’s used a site called ThreeJars (Allowance Made Easy) for 10 months. He claims to have saved $500 in allowance over that time. Not bad for a kid who only wanted enough for an iPad.
ThreeJars creates the incentive for the child to prioritize and set financial goals, and allows the parent to approve or deny various goals or money moves. It makes tracking easy, and visually appealing. The downside is that it cost $30 a year.
Two other, similar sites offer free levels of membership. They are FamilyMint (Helping kids appreciate money) and Zefty (Online Allowance and Money Management for Kids & Parents.
$30 a year seems reasonable if the product works. And I know many parents that would be doing their kids a huge favor by not passing on their own financial habits.