Seven fun ways to teach your children about money

During My Money Week 2021, we share tools from past interactive investor Teacher of the Year award winners.

• interactive investor is running a competition, interactive investor Personal Finance Teacher of the Year Awards 2021, to recognise excellence in financial education in both primary and secondary schools.
• £25,000 prize pot for winning schools, £50 vouchers for the first 250 teachers who enter.
• To nominate a teacher, parents, carers, or pupils should email teacher@ii.co.uk. Teachers can also nominate themselves using the same email address.

Today marks the start of My Money Week 2021, a nationwide initiative aimed at school-age children to help them develop skills and knowledge of money matters to help them thrive.

interactive investor has shared a selection of fun tips and tools that can be replicated at home from a selection of past winners of the interactive investor Personal Finance Teacher of the Year Awards.

Moira O’Neill, Head of Personal Finance, interactive investor, says: "The need for greater financial education is needed in today’s society where FOMO (fear of missing out) and YOLO (you only live once) cultures runs riot, resulting in people making some financial ‘no-nos’ that leaves them in a perilous position.

“We are living in an increasingly complex world in which the onus to ensure financial stability is increasingly being transferred away from the state to individuals. Teaching children about budgeting and saving from an early age and building on these with other financial principles, such as investing, throughout their education allows them to develop responsible financial behaviour that will put them in good stead once they reach adulthood.

“With tips from both primary and secondary school teachers, ranging from a pocket money challenge to bargain hunting, the past winners of our Personal Finance Teacher of the Year Award competitions offer some genuinely fun and engaging recommendations to cater for all ages.”

Nominations and entries for the 2021 interactive investor Personal Finance Teacher of the Year Awards are open until 2 July. The competition is open to both primary and secondary school teachers and the main prize pot is £25,000, shared out among the winning teachers’ schools.

2019 primary school winner: Sian Bentley, deputy principal, Queensmead Primary Academy, Leicester

Activity

Create your own restaurant

Level: Primary and Secondary (five to 16 years)

Money skills: Budgeting, Saving

How it works: Setting up a home restaurant is a clever way to help your children learn about money.

First, get your children to think about their favourite restaurant meal out or takeaway and have a look online to calculate how much it would cost the family to order a takeaway.

Then make a list of ingredients needed to help recreate the meals at home and work out how much this would cost.

Either using ingredients that you have or topping up during your next supermarket shop, make those meals at home.

Then calculate how much you have saved by cooking, rather than eating out or ordering a takeaway.

You can do different variations of this activity – for example, creating your own cinema, café or even spa.

Activity

Bare necessities challenge

Level: Primary (five to 11 years)

Money skills: Money management, Saving

How it works: Sit down with your child and write a list of all your regular costs, including bills, commuting, food, toiletries, cinema tickets, etc.

Review your child’s list first and work out what they are still receiving during the lockdown.

Then review your list and work out what you are still spending on, for example, bills, food and insurance.

Work out the items that you are no longer buying – for example, trips to the café, theatre or cinema.

Then discuss whether you miss those expenses and how much you are saving.

This can help children to understand the difference between essential and non-essential

2020 runner up (primary school): Tom Raffield, mathematics teacher, St David’s School, Purley

Activity

Create your own bank

Level: Primary (five to 11 years)

Money skills: Banking, Currency conversion, Saving

How it works: Get your child to identify something that they want – for example, a toy – and set its value as the target.

Then encourage your child to save money and log their progress.

Giving them the flexibility to save what they can will help them to work out how long it will take to reach that target.

To take this a step further, you could create your own household currency. Help your child to name and design the tender, and the conversion rate to pounds sterling. For example, 5 ‘Star Dollars’ could equal £1.

This new currency could be used to reward your child for helping around the house, good behaviour and doing well in home school.

At the end of the week, you can convert what they earn into pounds, which they can then choose to save or spend.

Emma Muckalt, Arkholme Church of England Primary School, Carnforth, Lancashire and Guy Acres, Joseph Hood Primary School, London (2020 primary school joint winners)

Activity

Baby related expenses and paper airplanes

Level: Primary (five to 11 years)

Money skills: Budgeting, borrowing and money management

Joint winner of the 2020 awards in the primary school category, Emma Muckalt of Arkholme Church of England Primary School, tailored personal financial education in a very clever way for her reception class, talking about financial wants and needs in relation to a baby – something that could easily be replicated at home with a shopping list.

Money was taught in the context of a baby's needs, with children asked to produce a simple list of items. With a budget of £10, this was a fun and engaging way to bring personal finance to life.

Guy Acres of Joseph Hood Primary School, London used paper planes as props to help engage kids with the idea of starting a business with little or no money. Here, children are divided into groups and tasked with setting up their paper airplane business, introducing the concept of debt and whether it good or bad to borrow money.

2019 secondary school winner: Helen Westwood, teacher of financial studies, Caroline Chisholm School

Activity

Pocket money challenge

Level: Primary (five to 11 years)

Money skills: Budgeting, Saving

How it works: Teaching children the importance of having an effective budget can help them develop good money habits as they grow up.

Creating a budget for pocket money is a fun and interactive way to learn money management.

Encourage your child to set financial targets – for example, saving for a new bike – and work toward these goals by setting money aside.

To help incentivise saving, you could also offer to pay top-ups when your child hits certain milestones.

For example, if they save £20, you may wish to add an extra £10 on top as a reward for saving. This helps develop an understanding of how saving works and the benefits of putting money away.

You can also get creative and use colouring pencils, crayons and other stationery to bring the budget to life.

Activity

Life savings challenge

Level: Secondary (12 to 16 years)

Money skills: Financial planning, Saving

How it works: Setting financial goals and planning how to achieve them is great way to help older children understand how to manage their money.

For this task, encourage your child to draw their 'personal life cycle', summarising the key financial phases of their life, and ask them to name three milestones they would like to reach.

Also ask them to jot down how old they would like to be at each milestone – for example, the age at which they want to buy their first home.

Help them calculate how much money they will need to achieve their goals by the ages they have set. With these figures in mind, ask your child to research the financial products that could help them fulfil these ambitions.

This task enables children to evaluate their financial priorities and work out how to reach their goals.

2019 Judges’ Award: Russell Wareing, head of business and economics, Lancaster Royal Grammar School, Lancaster

Activity

Payslip challenge

Level:  Secondary (11 to 16 years)

Money skills: Income, National insurance, Pensions, Student loans, Tax

How it works: This activity is designed to help older children understand how salaries work.

First, you will need a payslip. Your child may have one if they have started working, or you can use one of your own or find an example online.

A payslip will show the gross pay of the employee for the time they have worked, and deductions taken including PAYE tax, national insurance, student loan and pension contribution.

Some companies may also include deductions for benefits such as health insurance.

Payslips also detail how much has been earned in the tax year so far (April to April), the amount of deductions and the tax code.

Once you have taken away all the deductions, you will be left with the net take-home pay.

Going through a payslip will give you lots of personal finance topics to talk about, for example:

• How much do you earn in a year (gross)?

• How much do you take home in a year (net)?

• What percentage of tax do you pay on your earnings overall?

• What is PAYE tax and national insurance used for?

• Do you think tax rates are fair?

• Is it a good idea to have a pension?

• Is a degree worth the level of student debt?

To nominate a teacher, parents, carers, or pupils should email teacher@ii.co.uk with the teacher’s name along with the name and address of the school, by Friday 2 July 2021. We will then approach the teacher and ask them to submit their lesson plan and brief supporting statement (teachers will need to submit this by 15 July 2021).

Teachers can also nominate themselves, by emailing teacher@ii.co.uk with a lesson plan and supporting statement by 15 July 2021.

Editor’s notes:

Personal Finance Teacher of the Year – Competition Terms and Conditions

The competition is open to all qualified teachers employed at a primary or secondary school in the United Kingdom, but nominations can be made by anyone who is resident in the UK (including parents, guardians, and pupils).

How to enter:

Nominations can be made by anyone (including parents, guardians, and pupils) who is resident in the UK. They should be emailed to teacher@ii.co.uk by 2 July 2021 with the teacher’s name, and the name and address of the school. Teachers will then be contacted and asked to submit at least one lesson plan for a personal finance lesson and a supporting statement by 15 July 2021.

Teachers can also nominate themselves by sending at least one lesson plan for a personal finance lesson and a supporting statement to by 15 July 2021, along with their name, the name and address of the school and their email address and telephone number. The first 250 teachers who submit an entry for themselves will each receive a £50 Amazon voucher.

Only one entry may be submitted by any person.

The prizes:

The following prizes will be awarded to schools:

Personal Finance Teacher of the Year (primary school) 

Personal Finance Teacher of the Year (secondary school) 

Runner-up prizes, Judges' Awards and Highly Commended prizes may be awarded at the judges' discretion. The full prize money will total £25,000. 

All prize money will be awarded to the school.

Interactive investor Services Limited reserves the right to alter, withdraw or amend this competition at any time.

Winner selection and notification:

The winners will be selected by a panel of judges selected by Interactive investor Services Limited. Judging will be based on the lesson plans and supporting statements supplied.

The winners will be notified by mail, email, telephone or in person as soon as reasonably practicable after the judges have made their decisions. The notification will include details of how the prize can be claimed. In the event that a winner does not accept their prize, interactive investor services Limited reserves the right to select an alternative winner.

Personal Details:

The winners consent to the use by Interactive Investor Services Limited of the winner's name, and school name and town/City, for the sole purposes of announcing the winners. By claiming the prizes, all winners consent to the same.

Winners consent to their photos, names and the name of their school being used by interactive investor. By claiming the prizes, all winners consent to the same.

Winners consent to their photos, names and the name of their school being used by other media unconnected with interactive investor. By claiming the prizes, all winners consent to the same.

By allowing their nominations to be considered by the judges, all participants agree to be bound by these terms and confirm that the decision of Interactive Investor Services Limited is binding.

The competition will be governed by English law and entrants to the competition submit to the exclusive jurisdiction of the English courts.

Promoter:

The competition is run by Interactive Investor Services Limited, 201 Deansgate, Manchester, M3 3NW.