Teaching Kids How to Save

Teaching kids how to save is one thing that we should teach our children as early as possible so they will know the value of money. Nobody taught me how to save and nobody told me to save but I learned it through experience and through reading. You can read more here.

I have a five-year-old kid who is not familiar with coins and paper bills. Well, they have money lesson in school where they introduce different coins and paper bills. But of course he doesn’t know how to use it, I never gave him money to buy something in store or grocery. He has no allowance in school so I was having dilemma before on how to teach my son to save money. I shared that story here. 

If you remember my Smurfs 2 post, my son and I watched a movie together with his classmates. Yes, we had fun but after watching a movie and waiting for his daddy to pick us up, we stroll around the mall. One of his friends wanted to buy Minion so his mom bought the toy. Another friend wanted to buy the same toy and his mom bought it too. They were having fun with the stuffed toy and suddenly one kid said to my son “Kami meron nito, bakit ikaw wala?” 

At that moment, my son was sad and felt that he is missing something. He is not saying anything to me but I can see in his eyes and I feel that he wanted me to buy the toy. But I did not buy it. I received a call from his daddy that he was already in the parking lot so I said goodbye to my friends and we left. While walking to the parking lot, my son was walking so slow and I told him to walk fast because his daddy is waiting then when I looked at him, he was already in tears. I asked him, why he is crying?. He said “I want Minion”. I told him that we don’t have money for Minion so I just carried him all the way to the car. 

Of course, his daddy asked me why my son was crying and I told him the story. He asked me “Magkano ba yun?”, I said the price and he said: “Mura lang pala bakit di mo binili, kawawa naman Tantan ko (Ethan)”. I can’t remember the exact price but range is P120-170 for mini Minion stuff toy which is not expensive. But I did not buy it because we went to the mall to watch Smurfs 2 and not to buy anything. 

I want my son to learn... 

1. That we are not rich

We don't come from rich family, we live from paycheck to paycheck and we cannot buy everything for him. 

2. Not because his friends have it, he will have it too. 

Ex. His friend has a minion toy. My son asks for a minion toy and I will buy a minion toy. What if his friend has an iPad and my son wanted an iPad?

3. If he wants something, he needs to save. 

So few days before his birthday, we bought a piggy bank. I told him to save so we can buy Minion and last weekend we opened the piggy bank and he was able to save P702.55. Since he has no allowance he got coins from loose change, sukli sa pinamalengke, sukli sa tolgate and coins from his daddy’s pocket.

I asked him, what he wanted to buy and he said: “I want Minion”.

Deep inside I can still feel the pain “di pala nakalimutan ng anak ko yung time na hindi ko siya binili ng minion” but on the other hand I feel happy because he still remembers what I’ve said. “If you want to buy minion, save for it”. This is just the start of teaching him how to save, I know we have a long way to go. 

Care to share some tips.