My daughter is turning four next month. This is the first time that she has really understood the concept of birthdays (and gifts) for that matter. I want to thank the Saturday morning advertisers for all of the begging I’ve been putting up with lately, “mommy, maybe for my birthday I can get a big Dora castle like that one…” (and so on…)
As a result, I’ve been trying to teach her about money and how it doesn’t grow on trees – as my own mother once warned. I was trying to come up with a simple way to teach her the importance of saving for the things she wants (vs. simply begging for them). I was reminded of my cousin’s house and some three silly looking jars she had sitting on her counter.
“Hey Susan, is that your weekly allowance?” We teased her as we picked up the jars. “Sort of”, she replied…”but that one is actually the sharing jar”.
As I looked closer at the jars I noticed small inscriptions on the lid. One lid said, “to save”. The next said, “to share”. The third said, “to spend”. I noticed that the “save” one was almost full while the others only had a few cents in them.
She proceeded to tell us that she splits her childrens’ allowance into the three jars. For example, when she owes them $10.00 one third of the money goes into each jar. When the “share” jar gets full, they decide upon a charity to send it to. They can only access the “save” jar for more expensive items when it is full too. The “spend” jar is fun-money that they can use on a whim.
Isn’t that a wonderful idea? It’s a tremendous visual reminder for kids that will teach them that saving and sharing their money is just as important as spending it.