Erin Lowry of Medium.com asked me for some of the best strategies to help kids become good at managing money. My top strategy? Make money lessons concrete so the abstract idea of money, like the concept of “save”, becomes a concrete experience to be expanded on. 

You made it through the holiday bustle and maybe even found a few quiet moments to reflect on the year behind.  For me, the anticipation of returning to a “normal” schedule again is more appealing as each day passes.  As our family prepares to resume the regular routine, we are doing what many families do – plan ahead.  But, if you spent a little more during the holidays than you had intended, you may be dreading the looming holiday bills.  Here are a few tips from some of my past blog posts that might be helpful to get your family started on the right financial foot this year:

Create a Teachable Moment from Holiday Money Mistakes

January – A time for reflection

Money Tips from Octogenarians

Cash in those gift cards now!

The January “Allowance” Lesson

Wishing you and your family a money savvy year ahead.

Susan

Family wealth is obvious to children.  Your expectations surrounding how your children will handle the family’s wealth are not so obvious.  So, it’s important to talk with your children about the family’s goals for this wealth in a way that will allow you both to think creatively about how best to steward that wealth into the future.

Money itself and the language of money is straightforward; it’s literal, it’s not rocket science.  But talking about money can get complicated.  When you add emotion and experience – good and bad – to the discussion of money, that’s when it can get complicated.

Here are five tips to help you start this money talk :

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Parents and grandparents want to help make the child or children in their lives smart about money. I am often asked for tips. One tip I don’t talk about often enough is how to teach your child the language of money – and I am not just talking about the Rule of 72!

In our O.M.G. Official Money Guide for Teens, College Students and Couples book series, we talk about how to learn not only the mechanics of money but also how to employ this knowledge successfully using soft skills, like the ability to delay gratification.

Since I first published my list of “important money phrases to learn”, I have come upon one more that I think is worthy of adding to the list. So, here’s my new list – refreshed with some new knowledge:

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