My children are in primary school and I have started to give them ‘money classes’ since some of the important money knowledge is not taught at school. In the next few chapters, I’d like to share what I have taught them so far:
Function of Money
At a very young age, my children started to know money is very powerful. It can buy food, clothes, books, and toys. They also read from books people used to use shells, cows, and gold as money before using paper money today. I told them money can be used to store value (so they can hold on to their pocket money today but only spend it next week), measure value (so they can compare the value of two different goods), and as a medium of exchange (they can use money to buy stuff).
How Can We Earn Money
I told them there are a few ways we can earn money. One is from employment the company will pay salaries to the workers. That’s how most people earn money. People can also earn money if they run a business (for example an ice cream shop), or if they invest in a business (for example they give money to help someone open an ice cream shop and in return, they get some money back). The bottom line is we need to put in the effort to earn money.
Money vs Wealth
They asked me, if they earn a lot of money when they grow up, will they be very rich? I told them that depends. Being rich (or wealthy) and earning a lot of money is not the same. If they earn a lot but spend all, they will have nothing left, and they will not be considered rich. Wealth is what is left after spending. After learning this, my kids now will not spend all of their pocket money and they have started building their piggy banks!
To be continued…
我的孩子正在上小学，我已经开始给他们上“理财课程”，因为一些重要的理财知识在学校没有教授。在接下来的几章中，我想分享到目前为止我教给他们的东西：
金钱的功能
在很小的时候，我的孩子们知道了金钱的力量是非常强大的。它可以购买食物、衣服、书籍和玩具。他们还在书上读到人们在今天使用纸质货币之前曾使用贝壳、动物、黄金作为货币。我告诉他们钱可以用来储存价值（这样他们可以今天拿到零用钱，可下周才花掉）、衡量价值（这样他们就可以比较两种不同商品的价值），以及作为交换媒介（他们可以用钱买东西）。
如何赚到钱
我告诉他们我们可以通过几种方式赚钱。一种是从雇佣关系中，公司将向工人支付工资。这就是大多数人赚钱的方式。如此之外，如果人们经营一家企业（例如一家冰淇淋店），或者如果他们投资一家企业（例如，他们出钱帮助某人开一家冰淇淋店，作为回报，他们会收回一些钱），人们也可以赚到钱。总之，我们需要努力才能赚到钱。
金钱与财富
他们问我，如果他们长大后挣了很多钱，会不会很富有？我告诉他们这要看情况。富有和赚很多钱是不一样的。如果赚的很多，可是全部花光了，就一无所有，也算不上富有。财富是消费后剩下的。学了这些以后，我的孩子们现在不会把零花钱都花光了，他们已经开始搭建他们的存钱罐了！
未完待续…
#teachingkidsmoney
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