Teaching children about money and financial literacy is one of the most important life skills we can teach them, and the earlier we can start the better. Teaching preschoolers about money can be a daunting task, but these easy tips will make it fun.
I do not suggest you sit down with preschoolers and lecture them about the importance of budgeting, and explaining mortgages and 401ks.
Life skills for preschoolers are so important, and talking about money is often overlooked.
Ways to Teach Money Concepts
I am going to share my four top tips on how you should start teaching preschoolers about money.
1. Playing Shop
My number one tip is playing, and not just for teaching money but for every aspect of homeschooling. Kids pick up things much more naturally this way and let’s face it if they are playing they don’t think they are learning.
Playing shop is an absolutely fantastic way to talk about money with your preschoolers.
We used printable price tags and money worksheets to create a free shop in our home. Grab the kid’s favorite teddies and toys and add price tags to each of them and create a shop. I highly recommend also getting a cash register and some plastic coins but this is not required.
While playing shop you can introduce different coins and notes and explain the different values of each.
Take this into the real world, create a shopping list with your preschooler and ask them to help you shop for each item. Let them tick off each item when they add it to the cart. This is a great time to talk about budgeting, and explain that you can only buy the items you need today and not the items you want.
If you try tip #2 take the child to the store and let them pay for something with their own money.
2. Introduce Chores
Introducing chores at a young age is a great way to teach children about work and money.
For example, ask them to make their bed in the morning and give them $1 a week (or whatever you are comfortable with). Or create a reward jar and when it reaches 50% they get to watch a tv show of their choice, and at 75% they get an extra cookie.
This is a great way to talk about savings and how the more of something they can save the higher the reward.
3. Encourage Saving With A Piggy Bank
Get a piggy bank, or even better, make one. Keep it in a prominent position in their bedroom so they can see it. When your child gets cash for a birthday, Christmas, or for chores encourage them to save some of it.
For older children, I recommend opening a bank account, but for preschoolers, a piggy bank with coins and dollar bills is a great starting point. That way they can actually count the physical money, and literally, see it grow.
4. Count Money
This is the perfect next step after saving money in a piggy bank. Every month encourage your kids to count their money. Watching their savings grow over time is a great way to encourage savings. Another great way to count money is to play games such as Monopoly.
By using these top tips kids your preschoolers will start to understand money, savings, budgeting, and more. When they are older I highly recommend taking a more formal curriculum, we really enjoy Moneytime.
