I am getting tired of sweeping up pennies with alll the Cheerios under the dining room table and seeing Pookie shove quarters down the furnace registers just to hear the “clink clink.” My house is appraised at $250,000, but the real value is $250,009.34 when you consider all the coins in the duct work.
Geetle is beginning to understand the concept of money. She has some of the facts wrong. She refers to all coins as “monies” and all bills are “dollars.” Having 4 one dollar bills is better than having 1 five dollar bill….since 4 is bigger than 1. But she is learning. But having money is only fun for a minute or two, until she loses interest. Then her monies end up at the bottom of the toy box or in the closet.
To encourage her understanding of money and that it has value, I took the kids to McDonalds. I told them if they could find enough money on the floor of the car and in the cracks of their carseats, I would buy them juiceboxes. They both hunted, although I think Pookie was just having fun hunting, not really understanding the reward.
They found enough and got their juiceboxes. The next day we cleaned the house and I told Geetle her job was to collect all the real money and save it for our trip to Cincinnati. As I cleaned, I would yell “Real Money!” and she would come running with her dixie cup to collect the pennies I found in the couch or in the basket where we throw the mail.
She had fun and I think she gets it. I am trying to make her understand that money is valuable and that you should not just throw it in the toy box.
On Sunday, we are taking our lemonade stand to Grandma’s BBQ. We are supposed to be donating the money to the animal shelter, but would it be wrong if I let her and Pookie keep some? The whole point of the Take A Stand campaign from Sunkist (where we got out lemonade stand from) was to teach kids about charity. But how can I teach them about charity when they are just learning that money has value at all? I am trying to work on a lesson here. Maybe a TIP jar for her and Pookie? What do you think?
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lmvogt said,
July 18, 2008 @ 7:52 am
i THINK YOU COULD HAVE A VALUABLE LESSON AFTER THE LEMONADE STAND sales are over. Count up the money and then together decide how much they could keep, how much should go to buying supplies ( an important concept although Grandma and Grandpa would be glad to front the cost of supplies I’ll bet) and how much should go to the animal shelter. Monday would be a good day for all that. See you soon
heather said,
July 18, 2008 @ 9:04 am
Hmmm, I’m not sure what I’d do about the lemonade stand issue, that’s a tough one. Tip jar actually sounds pretty good.
One thing we did with our boys (our oldest is about to turn 6 and the youngest is about to be four) is buy them piggy banks for their money. We are trying to teach Little E the concept of money and whenever we find change around the house we give it to them. They know that if it’s on one of our dressers, it’s our money and they are not to touch it, but they know if they find it in the dryer, on the floor, or on the kitchen counter they can put it in their piggy bank. We had the same problem with them throwing it in the toy box or the toilet (our registers are in the ceiling, but the porcelain makes a lovely plinking sound as well!). Giving them a “special” place to put their money to save it is what we figured they needed (we also discussed getting them wallets but figured those would be lost quickly). So far it’s worked out great.
Rachel said,
July 18, 2008 @ 11:22 am
Maybe you could count up all the money they earn for the animal shelter, and then go to the pet store and show them how much a bag of dog food, a leash, water bowl, etc, cost and you could show them how much of each thing that their money could buy for the animals? Or you could buy dog food or something, and just take it to the animal shelter? I think maybe that way they would get the concept that you “trade” the money for things that you want.
Marcy said,
July 19, 2008 @ 1:02 am
One thing we did with the boys was buy them each a money jar that counted their coins. They loved putting money in to see how much it added up to, even tho they didnt really understand what that meant. Whenever they wanted something we made a chart showing how much they had to earn to afford the object of obsession, and showed them how the amount of money in their jar related to the money they needed. We also went around the house with post-its a labeled everything with what it cost. That earned their respect for expensive items like the couches.
http://www.amazon.com/You-Universe-Electronic-Money-Jar/dp/B001124QVK/ref=pd_bbs_sr_2?ie=UTF8&s=toys-and-games&qid=1216447306&sr=8-2