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?

That is all covered in KS 2 SATS maths.

It’s not to say parents can’t still help and teach kids how to budget etc, my point was more that life skills would be more valuable and useful in the real world than some of the lessons they currently have.

Ha, mine have much tidier houses than me, so they didn't learn that skill from me either.

Doesn't mean they all understood it or were able to apply it to real life. I've taught adults the concepts (adults as in young enough to have taken SATs) and plenty of kids still need to be taught it in KS3/4.

If they want to pass SATs reasoning papers they will.

Ok, you have a point with PT (though I cant remember any of it and would still need to Google how to measure 😂 )

Perhaps algebra or quadratic equations would have been better examples!

That's subjective surely. Maths for example is mandatory for many jobs such as STEM and teaching. It's good that all children start with a broad foundation.

It's a parental responsibility to teach basic life skills so that they bring up functioning adults. I've read on here about NT children who aren't even taught how to use a knife and fork and are shovelling food into their mouths with their hands at 11 years old.

Where does teaching other people's children how to function end?

I don’t think driving is necessary. It’s skewed towards the rich who can afford lessons. Most young people I know either can’t drive or learned in their mid-20s, well after university.

My father used to outearn the whole family and he single handedly paid for all bills and things. We lived in two houses in the land belonging to my grandparents. So they used their earning and later pensions for whatever they wanted, my mother used her salary for whatever she wanted, though she was very financially all over the place and he made her write her expenses and show him sometimes. He never asked her for money and always gave her even more.

When I went to secondary, he paid for my rent and bills also and my brother's , in two different towns. He made us do the same, just record our expenses and telling him sometimes , sorry, showing him. The idea was to learn to be accountable but not feeling he is hanging down our throats.

I married a man who treats me even better than my father. He pays for all and I save my salary, but he know that when I go, all savings will be for the family. So far , our kids have been exposed to a lot of financial talk. I will do the same when they become teens. Give them generous weekly amount and ask to see sometimes their expenses records and gently guide but never speak harshly.

Now, in my husband's family, the mother did all this with the books. My husband was savvy with money since day 1 he left home, his brother never saved until he was 43, never married, did random visits to Las Vegas and when the reality started dawning on him, that is either benefits in old years or you knock your head a bit.....he got it - 5 years later after saving and being humble, he bought a cheap abode in the North and keeps quiet now. It varies. We are all different.

I do wonder how some of DDs friends will cope in a couple of years when they head to uni. One of them called her the other day as her parents had left her home alone for a few days and she had googled how to make pasta for her tea. She called my daughter to ask how to tell when the water was boiling. 16 years old this kid, bless her.

Thankfully they've all got the internet at their fingertips so should be able to muddle through the gaps in their domestic education!

I don’t disagree with a lot of what you say, but I don’t think it would do any harm to have life skills taught in schools. There are lots children who struggle with maths in general so aren’t going to be studying it past compulsory GCSE. For those that like it and want to study further they can chose A-level maths. It’s obviously useful but budgeting could be more useful to those children as it’s relative.

I have mixed feeling about this. Firstly though, you sound very smug, although I suspect you’re a journalist because surely no one can be so confident (arrogant) about their parenting.

However, I wasn’t taught this stuff and it would have been a great help. But then I’d have had to spend more time talking to my parents and I’d probably have been sectioned as a result. I do tend to drop financial info into the conversation when I’m with my DS. He hasn’t had a job because he’s autistic and he’s sensible and has done well academically so for me, that’s enough. He’s at uni and I never thought he’d manage on his own so I think we’re doing ok. I’ve asked him if he wants to learn to drive and he doesn’t.

It is. It’s included in the citizenship and maths curriculums.

This is how I learnt. My mum and dad would visibly sit down weekly and go through their finances, we kids always had to accompany our mum to the weekly shop and help with carrying it all back (1970s so no deliveries). I was working at sixteen so from that moment anything I wanted such as clothes or entertainment I had to pay for myself. We also had to help at the weekly launderette visit so knew how to use washing and drying machines from a very early age.

My kids didn’t have these particular experiences but my eldest has always been naturally independent with laundry and cooking but terrible with money (despite my best efforts). My younger is off to Uni this year too and he’s not so independent but is very good with money. I do worry a bit if he’s going to be ok with the day to day grind but he’s smart and emotionally intelligent so 🤞

My parents taught me precisely nothing.

I'd never cooked a meal and my df would never have considered discussing anything financial. After all, women are stupid and don't need to know that stuff!! He didn't approve of wasting education on women.

I headed off to uni at 18, having forged my df's signature on the grant application form. I didn't tell them I was going until the day before. My dm gave me three cheap saucepans and a Good House Keeping cookbook the day I left. Other than that, I owned my clothes, my toiletries, a rucksack, my post office savings book and a radio.

I survived, I didn't starve. My diet wasn't great for the first six months but I didn't get scurvy or ricketts. Surely if someone is intelligent enough to go to university, they can find a supermarket & buy eggs, bread and tomatoes.

They should also be able to run a basic budget ...

• pay halls room
• buy books
• divide whatever remains by the 12 weeks of term
• realise they can't survive on £4.82 a week
• get a job as a barmaid

It's hardly intellectually challenging.

My ds can cook, understands nutrition, has a bank account, a savings account and a debit card. He'll cope too.

Someone upthread mentioned the word smug and I agree. I don’t really concern myself with the capabilities of other people’s teens and what their parents happen to have taught them.

Not all teens are equal and their ability to learn how to manage life alone is not linear, neither is it acquired by osmosis.

Neither of my two can drive because I don’t have the money to give them for driving lessons or a car. My eldest has just left uni and he wants to learn once he’s secured a proper job. My younger is off to Uni this year and doesn’t need to drive over the next three years anyway. He will have to finance that himself when the time comes.

Exactly this. It’s hardly challenging and part of the excitement of being on your own. You learn best through mistakes, trial & error and there is advice to be had everywhere when needed. This idea that modern day youngsters need to be taught how to survive and not let out until completely ready is such a mollycoddling modern view.

My two daughters were taught to cook and bake.. even do DIY/ decorating etc..l was a single parent and as they grew into teens we all did things together.. even laying flooring and flat pack furniture. They could wash and iron and do any cleaning ( although l never put on them to do this) l let them be teenagers and go out and enjoy their lives. They had part time jobs then full time jobs.. then became mothers.
They had bank accounts and when they got their own homes they knew how to pay bills and apply for TV licence etc.
If they didn't they would just ask.
I don't think it's rocket science it's just normal things passed on from parents.
My Parents taught me the above.. l taught mine.

Being able to speak to a stranger is a very basic life skill very few teens have. Why is this? Is it parents not insisting on their child joins in conversations around the table or encouraging their child to pay for goods in a shop or ask for tickets on a bus or train. Too many children that are petrified of looking at another human. If they can't ask for something they need they will struggle to cope with adulthood. Same as answering a phone, some are scared of talking on something they hold in their hand all day every day.

“Being able to speak to a stranger is a very basic life skill very few teens have. “

Do you have links to support this?

I went to university in 1990. I couldn't really cook (and didn't need to at all until my 3rd year), couldn't drive (had learned but hated it and didn't pass my test until a couple of years later). I'd had a Saturday job, but budgeting was (and to a certain extent still is!) an entirely alien concept to me. I got on just fine. I learned to cook easily by myself.

Dd has just finished her first year at uni and is much like I was (but a lot less spendthrift!). She's asked us to help teach her to cook a few staple dishes over the summer, but in reality she cba until she actually needs to. She's a confident person who knows that she'll work out how to do things.

I don't think that's true. Surely most teenagers go out with their friends,order drinks in coffee shops etc. Use public transport. Have part time jobs.

@RedHillSunsets such a cringey , self congratulatory thread. Let me guess op , you don’t think your dd’s parents have done such a good a job as you so now your own daughter has to “teach “ him . Big gold medal op . What about your other kids ? I’m not anywhere near this stage but all my sons can cook , (they are all under 13) save money etc etc . I’d never be arrogant enough to state I’m doing any better than other parents or their dcs. Also I work with teens (in what you in the uk call a pru type school ) and there’s a huge variation in what’s normal for children. My friends wonderful 18 year old son has memory processing problems and forgets to do things frequently. Sometimes it takes some young adults longer than others to get their own shit together tbh . I had a job from 14 , 3 kids in my late 20’s , both my dh and I have zero support but still managed to juggle three kids , post grads , house renovations etc. I’ve no idea whether my dcs will. My neighbours daughter lives at home at 25 and is quiet , doesn’t know how to drive , works v p/t, isn’t self sufficient. I e absolutely no idea re their lives , maybe she’s happy , maybe she has struggles. I’d never judge her or her parents. Such arrogance .

*your dd’s boyfriends parents obviously didn’t do as amazing a job as you ..