K-12 Financial Literacy

Non-investing personal finance issues including insurance, credit, real estate, taxes, employment and legal issues such as trusts and wills.
Post Reply
Topic Author
trystero
Posts: 21
Joined: Fri Apr 08, 2016 2:34 pm

K-12 Financial Literacy

Post by trystero »

Bogleheads,

My child is three, and she's at a wonderful pre-school in Los Angeles.

One of the (many) things that attracted us to the school is an emphasis on financial literacy education - even at this young age. For instance, each child has a job each week (librarian, kitchen helper etc etc) for which they get "paid" (in fake money). The school then opens up a store every few weeks. The kids are faced with a decision - buy a cheap trinket or save the money for something bigger. One time, the kids wanted to do a slumber party at school - no problem said the teachers, but it's going to cost money to do that. Will you pool your resources to make that happen?

I'm now on the advisory board of the school and have agreed to help flesh out the FL curriculum. Ultimately, the school hopes to expand all the way through high school.

I know - and have been delving into - the ton of research that is available out there, but wanted to take a moment to ask this community for your advice and input as we build the structure of the curriculum.

I know a lot of you have lectured/taught in schools from other threads. Any resources that you can point me to that you found particularly valuable would be much appreciated. Or, indeed, any resources you have or have created that you would be willing to share would also be amazing. In short, if you have any thoughts at all in this area, I would love to hear them.

Thanks so much in advance,
Trystero
Globalviewer58
Posts: 736
Joined: Fri Jul 18, 2008 3:26 pm

Re: K-12 Financial Literacy

Post by Globalviewer58 »

Our school district partners with Junior Achievement to teach financial literacy with community volunteers partnering with classrooms. The materials developed by JA cost $ which is covered from corporate donors and community fund raisers. The benefits are tough to measure. Interactive sessions seem to get the students involved and interested during the classes and hopefully planting the seeds in elementary school results in higher interest in education and a fulfilling career.
megabad
Posts: 3638
Joined: Fri Jun 01, 2018 4:00 pm

Re: K-12 Financial Literacy

Post by megabad »

Before you mentioned it, I was going to discuss the importance of teaching proper handling of money early on. Personally, I believe in giving allowances (with real money) very early on (ie. as soon as child knows what money is). I think what is important is the tangible act of having money and giving it up to receive something, and then not having money. The fake money/saving thing seems to help serve this purpose, so good on them. I think parents themselves may wish to affect this using real money, but the lesson is still the same.

Along the same lines, I think parents should generally bring children into a brick and mortar bank and physically open a savings account for a child very young. This allows concrete understanding of what a bank is and how it works. I am unsure if this could be worked directly into a preschool curriculum but it might be considered homework for parents.

I am sure you have already perused the National curriculum for personal finance at NEA, but I think the general recommended K-12 curriculum starts with basic understanding of saving and spending. I think this pretty much covers what a preschool aged child should grasp. Once the children get into school and advance they would cover banking, credit, and investing.

Essentially, my curriculum would necessitate first--reading skills, and also arithmetic and subtraction ability. Then we could move on to more specific elements of the earning, spending and saving process (as your fake money process does). The child should be allowed to make decisions about earning, spending, and saving. I like to frame the discussion as not forcing chores, but rather an offer. The free choice is what allows for quickest learning in my experience.

I guess most of my "curriculum" is geared more toward parents, but I applaud you for seeking to include personal finance in pre-school. I am curious to know how it goes and what you end up including.
elainet7
Posts: 387
Joined: Sat Dec 08, 2018 12:52 pm

Re: K-12 Financial Literacy

Post by elainet7 »

read Millionaire Teacher by Andrew hallam book for high school students
User avatar
GerryL
Posts: 3902
Joined: Fri Sep 20, 2013 11:40 pm

Re: K-12 Financial Literacy

Post by GerryL »

Check out the Financial Beginnings website at https://www.financialbeginnings.org/.

The Learn button will lead you to an outline of what the program offers for different grade levels, starting with kindergarten.
The Get button offers links to download their materials.

I have been volunteering with FB non-profit since 2014. I do presentations to high school classes on Credit, Budgeting and Investing. FB is offering a lot more content now than when I started. We are allowed to revise the presentations as long as we deliver on the key objectives. I have made revisions that make the flow more comfortable for me and emphasize certain concepts (e.g., passive investing).
User avatar
fortfun
Posts: 3146
Joined: Tue Apr 19, 2016 7:31 pm

Re: K-12 Financial Literacy

Post by fortfun »

I like the information that I found here:
https://www.smartaboutmoney.org/

SAM. Smart About Money. NOT backed by a bank, etc.
sschullo
Posts: 2840
Joined: Sun Apr 01, 2007 8:25 am
Location: Long Beach, CA
Contact:

Re: K-12 Financial Literacy

Post by sschullo »

Go no further than Tim Ranzetta of Next Gen Personal Finance: https://www.ngpf.org/
Never in the history of market day-traders’ has the obsession with so much massive, sophisticated, & powerful statistical machinery used by the brightest people on earth with such useless results.
User avatar
celia
Posts: 16774
Joined: Sun Mar 09, 2008 6:32 am
Location: SoCal

Re: K-12 Financial Literacy

Post by celia »

I, for one, don't like that emphasis on money and spending for young kids. Are they trying to teach them that they can/should buy anything they can afford? Kids can learn to count, add, and subtract without having to get a "reward" for it.

My kids played with a few neighborhood kids a few times then came home one day and said they didn't like playing with them. The neighbor kids were apparently bragging that they have a newer/ bigger/ fancier <items> than we do. I ended up telling them that is not the way we are raising them. We'd help find other kids for them to play with. (Our kids went to a church-sponsored school so were not at the same school as the neighbor kids.)

As adults, our kids ended up savvier than their peers when it came to money. They learned to comparison shop, weigh what they need vs. want, and find the same thing for less. And they all learned to prepare their own income taxes since the first full-time job they had. This helped them realize there are tax consequences to some of the decisions they make.
User avatar
dgm
Posts: 222
Joined: Sun Mar 13, 2011 10:32 pm

Re: K-12 Financial Literacy

Post by dgm »

I think math proficiency is an indispensable part of financial literacy.

A surprisingly large number of adults are not very good at percentages, compounding and are not adept at doing addition, subtraction, division and multiplication on the fly (or even estimating).

mortgages, credit card debt, financing, sales at the store, budgeting, stock options, taxes, insurance -- these are just a few of the every day items where being handy with math is a big advantage.

I would make sure that was a solid basis for any financial literacy. Math should be almost second nature.

To that end:
Singapore math curriculum (one of the most advanced in the world)
NAD83
Posts: 123
Joined: Thu Apr 07, 2011 1:25 pm

Re: K-12 Financial Literacy

Post by NAD83 »

Our school has Junior Achievement too. It's not bad, but I mostly see it as a way for these financial salespeople to get a foot in the door either via parents or by dropping off some "educational" materials in the teacher's lounge.
User avatar
LadyGeek
Site Admin
Posts: 95696
Joined: Sat Dec 20, 2008 4:34 pm
Location: Philadelphia
Contact:

Re: K-12 Financial Literacy

Post by LadyGeek »

This thread is now in the Personal Finance (Not Investing) forum (financial literacy).

Also see: Bogleheads® financial literacy project (For parents)
Wiki To some, the glass is half full. To others, the glass is half empty. To an engineer, it's twice the size it needs to be.
livesoft
Posts: 86079
Joined: Thu Mar 01, 2007 7:00 pm

Re: K-12 Financial Literacy

Post by livesoft »

Don't forget that some of the parents of children that are K-12 actually work for places that are dissed on this forum all the time such as Edward Jones, Morgan Stanley, Merrill Lynch, payday loan places, whole life insurance companies, high-fee annuity places. Thus any curriculum gets watered down to not be offensive to anyone.
Wiki This signature message sponsored by sscritic: Learn to fish.
User avatar
willthrill81
Posts: 32250
Joined: Thu Jan 26, 2017 2:17 pm
Location: USA
Contact:

Re: K-12 Financial Literacy

Post by willthrill81 »

livesoft wrote: Wed Mar 06, 2019 4:17 pm Don't forget that some of the parents of children that are K-12 actually work for places that are dissed on this forum all the time such as Edward Jones, Morgan Stanley, Merrill Lynch, payday loan places, whole life insurance companies, high-fee annuity places. Thus any curriculum gets watered down to not be offensive to anyone.
Excellent point.
The Sensible Steward
Dottie57
Posts: 12379
Joined: Thu May 19, 2016 5:43 pm
Location: Earth Northern Hemisphere

Re: K-12 Financial Literacy

Post by Dottie57 »

I would think the requirement in financial education would be to make sure kids can do the basic math required for evaluating options. No need to go into variations of annuities.
User avatar
BarbaricYawp
Posts: 158
Joined: Mon Mar 17, 2014 1:29 pm

Re: K-12 Financial Literacy

Post by BarbaricYawp »

celia wrote: Tue Mar 05, 2019 11:49 pm I, for one, don't like that emphasis on money and spending for young kids. Are they trying to teach them that they can/should buy anything they can afford? Kids can learn to count, add, and subtract without having to get a "reward" for it.
I don't think it's so much about teaching maths skills. Kids barter naturally, but aren't great at the concept of delayed gratification or the abstract of money as a means of storing value and energy. It can also be quite empowering for a young person to be able to make decisions.

I went to the bank with each of mine at a very young age and made a big deal of opening their very own bank account and depositing into it the Christmas check received from the grandparents as a starter. After the 'event' we talked about whether there was anything that they didn't get for Christmas that they would want to pull some of that money out to get. Periodically throughout the year I would offer payment for non-chore activities (like painting baseboards, washing dogs etc.) and they got to make the decision whether to keep some or all of the money to spend, or to deposit it. They had very earnest conversations with me and each other about what they wanted to do and it was fascinating to watch them debate each other about their decisions. Each one went through a short phase of pulling money to buy gifts for friends before they realized how hard it was to replace the money. So we talked about other ways to gift friends. We also talked about giving money to local charities (our local SPCA was a Christmas favorite and we would ceremoniously drive to the facility to hand over a portion of the gifted cash). All of them received full control of their accounts when they left for school and each had substantial balances available. I like to think the process of deciding whether or not to save -- and the 'value of a dollar' activity around replenishing money they had spent -- gave them a practical understanding of living within their means and the confidence in their ability to do so. The only downside for me is that they are SO non-materialistic that I find it hard to buy any sort of gifts for them. And of course, the fact that now they are starting to ask advanced investment questions that I have to come here to research. :P
"The cure for boredom is curiosity. There is no cure for curiosity." --Dorothy Parker
miamivice
Posts: 2973
Joined: Tue Jun 11, 2013 11:46 am

Re: K-12 Financial Literacy

Post by miamivice »

trystero wrote: Tue Mar 05, 2019 3:42 pm The kids are faced with a decision - buy a cheap trinket or save the money for something bigger. One time, the kids wanted to do a slumber party at school - no problem said the teachers, but it's going to cost money to do that. Will you pool your resources to make that happen?
I am curious if the examples above actually teach the kids anything, or let the kids who buy cheap trinkets do just that, and let the kids who naturally save do so.

And when you are teaching kids, is the school teaching that saving money is a better option than buying cheap trinkets, or is buying cheap trinkets a better option than saving money? It is very hard to teach morality. Some adults (and thus, some kids) will think buying cheap trinkets is a good idea while some will think saving is a good idea. To teach that one is better than the other is applying a judgment to a lifestyle choice of parents and children.

This is different than say English, where you teach that every sense must have a noun and a verb.

We had a similar fake money program a couple times in school. Since I was a saver, I always saved a lot of whatever. I didn't learn to save through the program, but saved because that is what I wanted to do. I remember in third grade I almost peed my pants in class because I didn't want to trade 1 smiley face for a bathroom pass. In 4th grade I saved up and nearly had the most "points" at the end of the year rather than buying cheap trinkets. Then the day after 4th grade, I realized that my points had no value and maybe I should have bought cheap trinkets because then I would have had something for my savings.

Financial literacy is a difficult subjec tto teach.
barnaclebob
Posts: 5586
Joined: Thu Aug 09, 2012 10:54 am

Re: K-12 Financial Literacy

Post by barnaclebob »

Interesting. Does the value of the item correspond linearly to the price? For example do the kids have to save twice as much to get something twice as good or do they have to save twice as much to get something 3 times as good?

Maybe they can offer lower wages on the preferred jobs. See where the market comes to equilibrium.
miamivice wrote: Wed Mar 06, 2019 5:29 pm I remember in third grade I almost peed my pants in class because I didn't want to trade 1 smiley face for a bathroom pass. In 4th grade I saved up and nearly had the most "points" at the end of the year rather than buying cheap trinkets. Then the day after 4th grade, I realized that my points had no value and maybe I should have bought cheap trinkets because then I would have had something for my savings.
I love it. See what happens when the students have to spend most of their money on "basic human rights" like bathroom breaks or access to the drinking fountain.
miamivice
Posts: 2973
Joined: Tue Jun 11, 2013 11:46 am

Re: K-12 Financial Literacy

Post by miamivice »

barnaclebob wrote: Wed Mar 06, 2019 5:37 pm I love it. See what happens when the students have to spend most of their money on "basic human rights" like bathroom breaks or access to the drinking fountain.
This was nearly 30 years ago. I don't believe today they are allowed to "charge" for bathroom access, as parents of elementary students want their kids to be able to use the bathroom when they need to.
User avatar
aspirit
Posts: 478
Joined: Tue Jan 02, 2018 11:52 pm
Location: SMA.SFL

Re: K-12 Financial Literacy

Post by aspirit »

Children handed money become accustomed to it. That’s reality in my experience.
Good luck!
Time & tides wait for no one. A man has to know his limitations. | "Give me control of a nation's money and I care not who makes it's laws" | — Mayer Amschel Bauer Rothschild ~
User avatar
celia
Posts: 16774
Joined: Sun Mar 09, 2008 6:32 am
Location: SoCal

Re: K-12 Financial Literacy

Post by celia »

I’m also confused since the title of this thread says K-12, but the OP started talking about their 3-year-old’s preschool. Then advanced topics like Junior Achievement were added.

OP is likely forgetting that the local K-12 has to follow state or district standards for each subject. Why not find out what math skills are taught in kindergarten and lead up to them. Also find out what the preschool curriculum is.
Rick Manchez 127
Posts: 8
Joined: Tue Jul 28, 2020 10:43 am

Re: K-12 Financial Literacy

Post by Rick Manchez 127 »

This resource has some good info and includes other resources external of itself. It talks about several points including virtual bank accounts which I think not only resonates with younger more digital oriented people but prepares for a growing cashless society. It also goes into tactics regarding managing money and breaks down the teaching suggestions into age brackets

https://www.finder.com/teaching-kids-about-money
Colorado14
Posts: 1792
Joined: Thu Apr 07, 2011 4:58 pm
Location: Colorado

Re: K-12 Financial Literacy

Post by Colorado14 »

NAD83 wrote: Wed Mar 06, 2019 2:40 pm Our school has Junior Achievement too. It's not bad, but I mostly see it as a way for these financial salespeople to get a foot in the door either via parents or by dropping off some "educational" materials in the teacher's lounge.
I'm a Junior Achievement volunteer/teacher and that hasn't been my experience. It's unfortunate that it is the case at your school. I'm not aware that JA works with 3 year olds however; their programs are designed for school aged kids, not pre-school/toddlers. JA has developed curriculum for various grade levels; sales pitches to kids are not part of the programs that I've led.
User avatar
arcticpineapplecorp.
Posts: 15081
Joined: Tue Mar 06, 2012 8:22 pm

Re: K-12 Financial Literacy

Post by arcticpineapplecorp. »

fortfun wrote: Tue Mar 05, 2019 7:20 pm I like the information that I found here:
https://www.smartaboutmoney.org/

SAM. Smart About Money. NOT backed by a bank, etc.
This website's coming down on July 31st.
It's hard to accept the truth when the lies were exactly what you wanted to hear. Investing is simple, but not easy. Buy, hold & rebalance low cost index funds & manage taxable events. Asking Portfolio Questions | Wiki
Post Reply