To think children should be taught financial literacy?

[HeidiHaughton]

All the threads from women in such precarious financial situations. Never seemed to occur to them the cost of not working. And the invariable refrain that it "didn't make sense to go back after maternity leave". Surely as a social good people should be educated about how finances work.

Magenta, I couldn't disagree more.

No maths is very relatable, I'm talking about teens not primary age.

By 15 if a child isn't understanding basic maths they are not going to and forcing them to waste hours of their life staring at stuff they cannot understand, is not helpful to them at all.

We really do need to arm them with the basics of budgets... Employee rights.. Nmw etc...

There are a lot of dc who get to 15 and can barely to the 3 times table. They are the very ones who need some financial sense... Put in a real life way... I mean you even give them an ocado shop to do for 4 weeks with x amount.. Rent x amount... Real life.

Years ago I used to teach a personal finance module on BTECs - was a bit of an eye opener.

@Womencanlift

To the pp that said what should get dropped from the curriculum I do think mortgages, how to budget, how income tax works etc. is more of an educational benefit than different types of triangles, all the sin/cos/tan stuff and lots of other things I have never used since I left my last maths class 20 years ago

I remember about people moaning about learning trigonometry when I was at school and saying it was pointless when it's actually so, so useful.

But regardless a tiny amount of time is spent on that compared to basic addition and subtraction (all you need for budgeting) and multiplication and percentages (all that you need to understand mortgages, credit card interest, etc). The curriculum already covers all of this. People not listening or being interested in learning it may be more of an issue.

@Mudmudingloriousmud

Magenta, I couldn't disagree more.

No maths is very relatable, I'm talking about teens not primary age.

By 15 if a child isn't understanding basic maths they are not going to and forcing them to waste hours of their life staring at stuff they cannot understand, is not helpful to them at all.

We really do need to arm them with the basics of budgets... Employee rights.. Nmw etc...

There are a lot of dc who get to 15 and can barely to the 3 times table. They are the very ones who need some financial sense... Put in a real life way... I mean you even give them an ocado shop to do for 4 weeks with x amount.. Rent x amount... Real life.

That's basic addition and subtraction that is the focus for much of primary school. The issue isn't the curriculum, it's people not engaging with the free education provided, which is very sad. But I don't think that is the fault of schools.

I understand debt and interest and all the rest, thank you very much. Unfortunately I also understood that however much my working was an investment in my pension, it wasn't always an investment we could afford at a time when the cost for childcare + travel to work came to more than my earnings (this was in the days before any subsidised nursery hours etc).

@OnlyFoolsnMothers

Would be very hard to teach without risking it becoming financial advice.

No it wouldn't, teaching about bank accounts, credit cards, budgeting, borrowing money etc has got nothing to do with financial advice.

I can't believe anyone thinks that anything approaching a regulated activity would be included

@Ohalrightthen you think people shouldn't have children in this country if they are likely to grow up in poverty? Have you asked many children who grew up in poverty if they would have preferred not to be born at all?

I grew up poor (comparatively). We couldn't afford to heat more than one room properly (we wore more clothes instead), we didn't go on school trips, got about 5% of the pocket money of our peers from normal earning families, and our clothes were mostly hand-me-downs. But we always ate food. Our earnings as a family were well below the poverty line, so technically I am a child who grew up in poverty (I would describe it as poor instead, as many people are much worse off).

I had an extremely happy childhood and grew into an adult with a sound understanding of money. I argue that a poor childhood can increase your chance of being able to manage money well, IF your parents help you learn. Would I rather not have been born? Errr... no.

YANBU.

I grew up being told it was rude to discuss money. I remember asking my stepdad how much he earned as I was genuinely curious and being shouted at for being so rude. The rest of my family were on benefits/disability/state pension and renting council houses so I was clueless. When I 1st got a job I blew every last penny...for years. I didn't even realise you had to pay for water until I had my own flat!

My husband on the other hand was brought up by people who educated him on money and saved into pensions and paid a mortgage. He is much better with money that me. Only in the last 2 years in my early 30s now I have started saving towards a house deposit, sorted my credit rating and got several pensions and insurance.

I have sat down with my kids, showed them how much money we earn and asked them how much they think we pay for things and showed them on little slips so they understand what bills have to be paid and the value of money. They are still young and will teach them properly when they are older. Of course the parents should do it but some parents just aren't capable as they haven't got a clue themselves!

@corythatwas

I understand debt and interest and all the rest, thank you very much. Unfortunately I also understood that however much my working was an investment in my pension, it wasn't always an investment we could afford at a time when the cost for childcare + travel to work came to more than my earnings (this was in the days before any subsidised nursery hours etc).

I think this is the thing. The vast majorit of people IMO who struggle to budget/ manage their money do so because they don't earn enough of it. That is a societal, structural problem.

I suppose there's an argument that making the unfairness of it clearer might create the political momentum to change it, but that's not the same as saying it's a problem because people don't "get it". I think pretty much every adult understands that more money going out than coming in leads to misery (and most children, per Oliver Twist etc!)

I believe most people who struggle to budget do so because the cost of living compared to their reasonably achievable salaries is too high, or because they are struggling with other issues like addictions, compulsive behaviour etc.

Not judging this before people jump on me - I believe this as I've experienced some of these things myself! And people should get support to help them in those circumstances, in that way our society is extremely rubbish. I'm just not sure that not being able to add and subtract is the problem in most cases.

I'm on the fence. Schools can and do include a fair bit of this, although it's left up to the school how much. But virtually all maths courses include this stuff as examples in the textbook, plus there is PHSE, business studies, Economics, Young Enterprise and a plethora of competitions and resources (Barclays used to do good ones). But only a minority of students ever seem to be interested - I think it's one of those things that's hard to imagine needing till you do.

Plus as a teacher, most of my colleagues are woefully ignorant about financial matters!

Magenta, are you a passionate maths teacher?

Maths is a tricky subject and many dc are visual learners who get lost because we can't do bespoke teaching in our school.

You say dc won't engage with free eduction and that's not the fault of the school? You sound defensive?

Who said it was the fault of school? Actually I do think it is because school cannot be flexible enough but with large classes maybe they can't but I often wonder what a small bit of thinking out the box would do.

As a society we shouldn't be leaving a 15 year old to flounder and waste time in maths lessons.
We should make sure they can do basic adding, subtracting... Times tables and basic fractions.

Then we should teach them budgeting.. On food shop sites, role play Saturday jobs, wages, as I said before empower them.

No it wouldn't, teaching about bank accounts, credit cards, budgeting, borrowing money etc has got nothing to do with financial advice ok give an example of how to teach about credit cards without sound positive or negative

I do think mortgages a basic overview would be helpful!

God yes: compound interest!

Magenta I know people who earn lots and can't budget it for all areas of society really and some v wealthy carful people who budget too much!!

I know v wealthy people who think having a stock and share investment is literally buying and selling shares at the right moment.. To make a fast buck!!

There is a lot of misunderstanding out there and dc should be drilled in the food budgeting, rent, clothes before they hit 16..

@PotteringAlong

I agree they should be taught by their parents, but I assume you mean at school. The question then becomes what do you want to get rid of out of the curriculum to add it in. There are not an infinite number of hours in the day to allow every life skill you might ever need to be taught in the classroom.

Trouble is that’s assuming the child's parent has good money management. I think it should be taught in school generally.

Would you warn them about the loan sharks, credit card fees.. Show them if they borrowed x how much they would pay off.. That factual. You would then also show them where and when cc are helpful and how to use them safely.

Also cc judgments.. I accidentally defaulted on an overdraft.. It was on my record for years and years.

Arming them with information..

@Mudmudingloriousmud

Magenta, are you a passionate maths teacher?

Maths is a tricky subject and many dc are visual learners who get lost because we can't do bespoke teaching in our school.

You say dc won't engage with free eduction and that's not the fault of the school? You sound defensive?

Who said it was the fault of school? Actually I do think it is because school cannot be flexible enough but with large classes maybe they can't but I often wonder what a small bit of thinking out the box would do.

As a society we shouldn't be leaving a 15 year old to flounder and waste time in maths lessons.
We should make sure they can do basic adding, subtracting... Times tables and basic fractions.

Then we should teach them budgeting.. On food shop sites, role play Saturday jobs, wages, as I said before empower them.

I am neither a teacher nor a mathematician, so certainly no reason to be defensive on the subject. Sorry if it seemed like that, I was just expressing a view. I am passionate about children having equal life chances and am just questioning whether this is really the underlying issue here - the school curriculum - or other factors.

I agree that large classes in schools are hugely detrimental in general, education needs funding much better and perhaps pressure for that will come from the pandemic.

As to floundering, nobody should be left to flounder. No child should be leaving primary school without being able to add and subtract so I understand why secondaries aren't focusing on that primarily. There are ways to teach things to different children with different learning styles, like Numberblocks on iPlayer, that's been brilliant for helping my visually focused pre-school DC understand how numbers work. I do think the UK education system is pretty appalling really. I'm just not convinced by the arguments in the thread about how it needs to change, but I'm interested to read other people's views about it.

@00deed1988 I think it’s an excellent idea to sit down with teens especially and explain what you have coming in! So they have an understanding of how expensive things are.

Ds has done a personal finance module in school and they get told about this in pse, but really this is something for parents to teach their kids.

Role play Saturday jobs? That is an employers job when they employ a young person.

Schools have enough to do without taking on parents and employers jobs too.

ok give an example of how to teach about credit cards without sound positive or negative

I don't understand what you mean, explaining how a credit card works is neutral and factual, why would it need to be positive or negative?

Not only that, but we actually need children for society to work.

That's a bit of a short sighted view of it. We need more children to service the current population levels, yes. But that will only end in an arms race of producing children to educate them to service the needs of other, much richer, human beings.

Far better to face facts than neither the environment nor the increasing mechanisation of the service industry can sustain current population levels and accept that no one deserves children.

And if that sounds harsh, it's approximately a thousand times less harsh than the consequences of uncontrolled population growth. The earlier the measures occur - education being the principal measure - the better.

• I believe most people who struggle to budget do so because the cost of living compared to their reasonably achievable salaries is too high, or because they are struggling with other issues like addictions, compulsive behaviour etc.

@MagentaDoesNotExist this is the whole point of money management. Weather your budget is greater than the persons next door it doesn’t matter. Everybody has a budget even some celebs will need to budget to some extent.

Budgeting is not just a thing that exists for low amounts of money.

This definitely happens in some families. I don’t know if it’s an economic class issue or just particular people. I remember my parents taking me with to help buy a new car. They showed me all the details of the negotiation, the cost, the financing. Funnily enough, last night at dinner I was discussing with DH making some adjustments to my pension contributions. I made sure to have that conversation at dinner so it would happen in front of dd and she could ask questions.

I do think it becomes tricky to do at school because many of the things that are the “right”way to do things are simply not feasible for some families.

Umm well its a variety of factors, if your parents are at war or you don't really have a stable family, and you go to school unsettled you won't get dc to learn much but.. Visual learners need more than a colourful TV program?. I mean physical, tactile learning, multi sensory lessons.. Attacking the learning in different ways.

So many dc are from no stable family at all.. One night stands.. As I said earlier.. No actual parent who wants them because they are on to families way down the line?.

Many dc will not understand the more complicated maths, they understand the basics but they will go no further and above all, no maths teaching has context or meaning for them at all. It's random and remote.

However, 15,16 year olds who may have Saturday jobs or want to drive, buy their own clothes.. become independent... Maybe more open to learning about this... Life skills.

I'm telling you now, starring at triangles isn't going to arm them with the financial skills they need.

Look at the lottery winners who blow it in a year.

Some basic financial savvy they would never blow it all!!

Infact.. Arming the dc I know with basic savvy.. Encouraging them t to save open up sipp and isa.. They may end up ahead of wealthier peers who have no financial savvy.
It's not hard!!