Thrifty Thinking: 5 Tips on Teaching Your Kids Financial Discipline

Kids are at the learning stage of their life. They’ll pick up and remember anything from their surrounding, especially from the parents. So, if you want to teach your kids how to handle their money, start as early as possible. If you’re not sure how to do that, stick around because this article will give you 5 tips on teaching financial discipline to your kids.

Make them understand the value of money If your kids want a new toy, don’t just give it to them. They have to buy the toy with their own money. But how? You could teach them to make money. Make cookies and tell your kids to bring it to school and sell it to their friends.
Or you can have your kids do chores like sweeping, cleaning dishes, washing clothes, etc. in exchange for a couple of bucks. This is important to teach your kids that if they want something, they have to work for it. 

Start the habit of saving money
A habit that starts from an early age usually lasts until adulthood, including the habit of saving money. Buy a piggy bank for your kids to allow them to start saving money. Every time they receive money after selling cookies or doing chores, tell them to put the money straight to the piggy bank.
Your kids might be angry or upset at first because kids don’t have long-term thinking. All they want to do is to spend their hard-earned money right away. Give an understanding to your kids that by saving money, they can buy the latest PlayStation or iPhone, instead of wasting their money on smaller and insignificant purchases. 

Teach them to make financial goals
Without clear goals and objectives, it’s very easy to slack off. That applies to your kids too. If they don’t have financial goals, they wouldn’t so keen on saving their money. So, teach them to make both short-term and long-term financial goals.
Short-term goals involve your kids’ daily and monthly expenses like food, transportation, clothes, etc. While long-term goals include things like vacation, the newest gadget, and fancy toys. 

Don’t introduce them cashless payment yet
At their young age, it’s better not to introduce them to the convenience of using cashless payment just yet. Just keep using cash and piggy banks. Why? Because even as adults, there are times when we couldn’t control ourselves and overspend when using cards and digital wallets. If we can’t, there’s no reason that the kids can control themselves.

Let them make mistakes
As adults, we still make mistakes regarding our purchases and financial decisions from time to time. So, don’t ever punish your kids when they make a mistake. Instead, take this experience as a teaching point later on.
Share your own financial stories with your kids, and let them learn from your successes and failures.

Author’s Bio
Andre Oentoro is one of the co-founders of Milkwhale, an internationally acknowledged infographic production agency. He helps businesses increase visibility on the internet with visual data and well-placed outreach campaigns