To think that too many parents don't equip there older teens for adult life.

[RedHillSunsets]

DD is awaiting her A-level results and should start uni in September. Some of her friends have already been in uni for a year. I left home at 18 to train as a nurse (pre uni courses) and had been taught to cook, budget and sort things out for myself in readiness for entering the adult world.
I have tried to ensure that DD is also prepared. She can drive, cook, and budget and has a current account, savings account, and LISA. She has had a part-time job since she was 15 and plans to continue working through uni as the job is in a field related to her degree. We discuss things like mortgages, income tax, NI, loans, credit cards, bills, and insurance as I think financial education is so important.
It shocks me how little financial awareness and basic life skills many of her peers have.

Did your parents teach you the life skills you needed and will you pass them on to your children?

When I was moving out at 23, I asked my dad how much electricity bills usually were. He wouldn't discuss it; it wasn't polite to discuss money 🙄

We're moving house at the moment so my 14 an 12 year olds are getting a solid grounding in mortgages, and they're familiar with my budget. They both have revolut accounts and cards. Being 'polite' is much less important than basic financial literacy.

I think it's one of the best things you can do for your DC.

I know this because it was not done for me and let's just say the years between young adult and actually adulting were challenging.

My DD has just finished uni this summer. She could cook, understood the need to keep track of use by dates etc so food wouldn't go to waste, knew the basics of cleaning and laundry and can drive. She had been taught to budget but wasn't very good at it tbh. She did know to avoid her overdraft but there were definitely a few occasions where she couldn't buy fresh food for a while.

In the 4 years she was there, she has had 13 flatmates and then a house share of 8. Approx 4 if those people could cook. Not sure about financial with most of them but at least 3 have gone thousands into their overdrafts. One of them is £4000 owing.

My ds isn’t going to uni but he’s as uni ready as his older sister who has just finished year 2.

They were surprised at some of their fellow pupils. For example one boy had his parents drop off
clean laundry and pick up dirty laundry and another was shocked when on the first night ds bought a garlic bread baguette as a side to his dinner and cooked it. That was when he realised that I’d done him a favour teaching him basic stuff like that.

My kids all drive but were taught to use public transport. Dd is at a uni where you can’t take a car so not being scared of public transport or taking an Uber has proved useful. She had friends in Sixth Form who weren’t allowed to get in a taxi when we live in a city where taxis are plentiful and easy to book/track thanks to apps.

DD is currently teaching her boyfriend to be savvier with money............ie making his own lunch rather than buying supermarket sandwiches, and buying frozen pizza and adding topping rather than ordering a takeaway!

My parents didn't sit us down and teach us, we learnt through day to day life as it was tangible.

Going to the supermarket with mum and her shopping list, mum checking prices, and best before dates, planning what would be eaten when. Helping every day with made from scratch family meals. Dad complaining about the balance on the credit card, going over the paper phone bill, his book with the monthly finances, and how to pay things off and his aversion to debt. The insurance man coming to the door to collect premiums. Dad researching hire purchase, their first mortgage etc didn't teach us how mortgages worked but taught us it was important to research, understand and think things through before committing to anything Etc etc

Part of the problem now is kids are never in to see and hear the ins and outs of family life, few do chores even fewer have cleaned a bathroom, or parents shelter them from any problems, and if they are home they are attached to screens which means they don't naturally pick up these things happening in the home. How many teenagers do you see helping with the weekly supermarket shop every week? So much is "invisible" and online now.

I make an effort to involve ds where and when I can and he is pretty competent.

I was taught to budget but not to cook (no idea why they was over looked). I managed to teach myself to cook though (maybe not to dinner party level lol)

Why do you think these basic skills aren’t always taught though, it’s basic parenting isn’t it and I fear it starts much earlier than teaching teens these things and earlier life skills are also being missed?
I imagine there are a number of factors and reasons they aren’t always getting passed through to teens and children.

lack of responsibility given? Independence? Parents doing tasks and not allowing or encouraging teens to help or take a share? (Easier to do it yourself than have the argument about “helping”?)
Not communicating what’s going on financially? Time poor parents? Mental overload for busy parents?

I wouldn't say I was taught exactly. Modelled would be a better word. I was part of family life. Financial things weren't hidden from me. The kitchen door wasn't closed. I had chores to do.

I do think some parents shield their children from the reality of life. The ones that max out their credit cards to give their kids expensive stuff, etc. The most important thing drilled into me was that my outgoings shouldn't exceed my income.
I've pretty much lived by that maxim and it's worked for me.

Up to a point I think you're right, but the truth is whether you go to uni knowing all that stuff or not, you pick it up easy enough (except the driving, which is expensive and you need access to a car).

When I look back, some of my favourite memories are sharing our very basic cooking skills and pooling fivers to get the electricity back on. I had a current account but no savings accounts or LISA. My budgeting was back of an envelope at best and I didn't have a clue about anything basically - most of us didn't, and it was fine. We learned. By the time we left uni we knew everything we needed to know.

I never knew anyone struggle at uni from not knowing basic life admin stuff, because you can always work that out. The people who struggled were ones with poor social skills, people who had been coached beyond their true academic ability, people who had chosen the wrong subject or who had mental health issues to begin with.

I tried very hard to equip mine, however they also have to be prepared to listen and learn!

Same as others, no one 'taught' me as such, I had a very early start to jobs, working from 14 in a variety of after and pre school jobs, then saturday jobs and the much coveted double pay for Sunday opening and then bank holidays, then working all through the summer holidays, half terms, christmas breaks etc etc. Saved up loads of money but I also spent a lot, had control over my own income. I continued through college, uni (wasnt supported or funded by any other means) to work a number of different jobs

I love food so learning to cook was instinctive to me and Im keen to have things clean and tidy so again just knew or understood how to maintain things and manage domestically

But I dread reading or hearing about kids whose parents wont push them into part time jobs, citing they're tired, too much home work etc etc. This is where you learn your most valuable life skills and abilities, learning to mix with lots of different age group people.

And dont get me started on the much misused 'brain not yet developed' bullshit.

Op I think you haven't allowed.for those of us that also find these things important and we do teach our kids as well but it doesn't sink in, (and I've said this before ) you can't take all the glory for your child being savvy..it's down to the child as well and how well they interpret the information you are giving . Not everyone can get their heads around these things , I certainly didn't as a teen but I'm more then capable now. We too teach our dc about these things. Open them accounts, teach them about budgets and so on, I discuss the household bills with them too. Goes in one ear and out the next. That's fine I know it will sink in eventually and that's fine too.

I agree with this. I had no interest in learning to cook but I soon learned. It's not a hard skill and my mum did a lot of cooking so it was modelled that you cook dinner rather than get a takeaway or whatever. Same with my eldest she has resisted all my attempts to get her to cook but she's fine at uni.

I don't know if I'm alone on this but I find these threads really smug - people patting themselves on the back about what great parents they are compared to others. Most parents get some things right some things wrong.

When I was at uni I was shocked by how useless many of my flatmates were! No concept of basic things like making sure bills were paid, how to cook, common sense around basic life skills - I don’t think it’s a new thing that some parents don’t teach their kids how to actually fend for themselves sadly.

No my parents didn't tech me any of that but also did nurse training and learnt quickly. My Dd is going into her last year at uni and is a fully fledged independent adult without much intervention from me. We all get there.

This is exactly my experience. I was capable of working most practical issues out myself, and if I failed then I learned from my mistakes.

I do wish I'd been taught a bit more social etiquette though. As a young adult at work I said and did many things that now make me cringe as I wasn't respecting the boundaries of others. I'm now self taught in all that stuff.

Yes, I make mine do chores especially in the hols as we both work full time. Work from 14 (paper round, coaching, retail) and explaining what things cost. Trying to teach them to cook also. It's essential.

Social skills also as mine were rubbish!! 🤣 Genuinely held me back in life.

We did make the effort to teach stuff as described by you, some of my students bowled up incapable of basic life skills such as budgeting and cooking. It was always a bit of a shock really. I remember a parent complaining her child had been given self catered accommodation as not their choice as they couldn’t cook and were used to a cooked breakfast every morning. It was honestly the parents that made me glad to take early retirement. It became worse as fees got higher as some saw us as a business and not educators.

I had a weekend job from an early age and was expected to do chores, including cooking for the family from a teenager. My parents didn't actually sit me down and explain anything but by the time I left home, I could budget, clean and cook.

Nowadays you've got parents masticating their children's food into their 30s

I fully appreciate that you can't force a child to act on what you have taught them, all a parent can do is inform and hope they learn.
What I find sad is that so many who don't try!
I have a sibling who was brought up exactly the same as me but who is useless with money 😂

No, I obviously want to keep my children as children for as long as possible and couldn't possibly imagine equipping them for the adult world. Bless their wee sensitive souls. Etc.

I think it is not so much smugness as anxiety and self-reassurance, maybe from someone who didn't go away to uni.

I do try to consciously teach life skills to my DC, as I was rather under-equipped for adult life. But even if that is the case, you generally work it very rapidly. Although I can see that these days, an inability to cook could be permanently disguised by the use of convenience foods or takeaways.

However, I would say that it’s important to remember that not everyone is the same or comes from the same starting point. A neurological condition such as epilepsy or a learning difficulty might be ‘invisible’ to the casual observer, but there may be good reasons why a teenager isn’t yet doing a Saturday job or learning to drive.