The Smart Piggy Bank
by leigh
The girls’ bdays are approaching, and with one heading to Kinder, I thought it was time to work on their concepts of money management. I am so glad I found this Trio Bank from Learning Cents. It is so cool - it’s divided into three sections: Spend, Save and Give. I always make sure to talk aloud about ways our family gives, how good it makes us feel, how many wonderful people there are in the world, and of course how lucky we are! Now they have a physical way to use their own money and start the habit of giving as a part of their everyday lives.
We started off by counting all the coins in their old piggy banks, and then discussing how to split up the money. We decided on the ration of 2-1-1 for Spend, Save and Give. They even have a dry erase spot on the lid so you can keep track when you add money or take it out. This way, if they see something they like at the store, we’ll know if they can afford to buy it or not. When the Save gets full, we’ll take them to the bank and open a real savings account, and add to it each time it gets full.
For the Give, the pamphlet recommends giving annually, either at their birthdays or holidays. I told Alyssa that this year she can buy a present or two for our Adopt-A-Families, and she got so excited!
The next step for our family is to start chores and an allowance (the pamphlet recommends a dollar for each year, so Alyssa, when at age 6, would get $6 a week). Time for me to head to the teacher store and get a good chart and some stickers!
