When my daughter was younger and she started earning money for chores around the house and receiving birthday money from relatives, I thought it would a good time to start teaching her about finances and saving. So I jumped right in and explained to her that putting some money aside, say 10%, would be a good thing and asked her if she wanted to open a bank account like her older brother had.
Her reaction was not what I was expecting. She got this horrified look on her face like I was mad at her , or that she had done something bad, and promptly ran to my wife and burst into tears crying about how I wanted to take her money away from her.
Gee, I wonder if she’s going to grow up to be a great Tea Party Republican . . . 😉
However traumatic this was for her, and me, it did seem to make a positive impression. Years later when she wanted a dog, and a car, and to go shopping with her friends and at the same time realized that she would be going to college in a few years; my daughter decided she needed a job and to save for each of these goals. So, she asked to open a regular checking debit card account with a basic savings account and a joint account with us that she can’t touch until she is 18 (that one is for college) and each paycheck gets divided up among all the accounts.
After everything was set up and working smoothly, she commented to me one day that my idea about saving, putting money aside, was a pretty good one. She just wishes I hadn’t made her cry about it.
I feel slightly vindicated.
And yes, she nearly cried when she saw that taxes were taken out of her very first paycheck. I told her not to worry because she’d probably be getting some of it back.
Today, with the internet, there are a whole host of online resources you and your children can use to learn about, well, just about anything. And their methods are far less draconian than mine.
Here are some of my favorite ones:
Fumbled Returns 