#258 – How to Teach Children Money Management With Halloween Candy | Revisited

Hey, Money Bosses. Anna is here, and

welcome back to the Money Boss Podcast. I am excited for this

episode. I'm excited for all the episodes, but this one should be

fun, because I want to really use this theme of holidays

upcoming and start to kind of be creative how we teach money

lessons to our kids. So let's talk a little bit about how

Halloween candy, and I know it's coming down the road, could be

used to start introducing these money concepts that we've been

talking about for quite some time on the podcast already. So

with that in mind, I know there's a lot of promotion going

on at the moment. People are starting to put up their

Halloween decorations. I actually am going to dig that up

this evening and start to even though it's like just the

beginning of the month of October, it's going to be here

before we know it. And something really fun that we are doing

this year is that, well, first of all, we're going to see my

family on the east coast, but also going to spend the

Halloween with them, and it's been years. We've lived in

California for 10 years now. It's been years since I was

actually in Maryland for the Halloween. I love all the fall,

and so looking forward to that. So I already know we're going to

have a lot of Halloween candy, because my family, my brother,

has kids, and I know we're going to go trick or treating, so I

want you to kind of think about All right, here's what's

happening with the kids, and I think this, if I further think

about this concept, how do we use the candy as a teaching

lesson? The kids, probably of all ages, can benefit from this.

I've been talking quite a bit with you about the different

types of accounts you can set up and and the three jars concept

and introducing allowance. So keep those concepts in the back

of your head while we kind of going through that. So here are

my kind of six ways, slash analogies, how you can use

Halloween candy to learn more about what your kids are

understanding about money, and start to introduce these

concepts to them and make them more real. Because which kid out

there in the world doesn't like candy? I don't think I can find

anyone. So here we go. Okay, I've got six ideas for you. So

number one is, how motivated are your kids to work for this

candy? I know everybody loves it, but How hard are they

willing to work so, you know, granted that you had already

purchased them a costume or created one from scratch

yourself. I wish I was that handy. What are they willing to

do in order for you to take them out for trick or treating,

right? Or even buy them a costume? Of course, I'm lacking

ideas at the moment for my almost three year old, but and

he's been telling me, it's funny, he's been telling me

lately that he does not want to go trick or treating. I'm not

sure what that's about. He only has really two years of

experience doing that, probably just something he watched on

YouTube about Halloween being scary. But I'm still going to

figure out a way for him to earn, right, this opportunity to

go out and Trick or treat, or an opportunity for us to spend

money and buy him the costume, so it's not something that it's

expected right every year for the parents to do. So I wonder,

what is it that you're going to do to motivate them to actually

earn this awesome, awesome experience. So that's number

one. Number two, let's talk about saving versus spending

concept, and if we're using candy as a currency. So our

currency here is candy, and kids understand that concept very

well. Is there any candy left in their blow buckets before you

get home for trick or treating. So look at that right, and then

talk to them about these concepts, right? When you have a

lot of candy, and that's what's going to happen on that night.

What do you do with it? Do you just eat all of it on that one

night? And maybe you eat more than normal. But is there an

opportunity for you to introduce the idea of maybe putting some

of that candy aside and come back to tomorrow, right? Or come

back to it, or save it for for the rest of the week, so that

you can enjoy it a little bit every day. I think the three

jars concept would be really, really handy in this, because

that includes the save, spend and give jar. You know, maybe if

they spread them out, even buying those jars would be

really cool. I will include the link in the show notes. I have

found a really inexpensive plastic jars on Amazon that have

a little lid and it has a select for you to drop points. I don't

think you can put candy, but you can still probably use those

jars to accomplish the same thing. So go back and listen to

that episode. I think it's a really handy for this particular

concept. But I can almost see how like using the candy,

spreading it out into these three jars. And you know, maybe

some of the candy you can give away to mommy and daddy, right,

two days from now. Or you can, you know, you can eat whatever

it is that you designated to spending, which is your eating

bucket, and then the one you're saving you're going to keep for

a little bit. So I hope that makes sense. Number three on my

list is budgeting versus binging. So introduce the daily

limit on how much candy can they eat per day, right? And compare

that to real money. So if you have five pieces of candy you

are allowed to eat from that batch that you collected on the

Halloween night. How long is that going to last you? And the

same thing, if you had $5 or $50 or whatever that number is, how

long is that going to last you? Can you spend $5 every day?

Maybe you buy a cup of coffee or a lunch or something like that.

So use the candy as the currency to start to introduce that

being, you know, having a plan versus, just like eating it all

right? And again, I'm not, after not giving kids the opportunity

to enjoy this holiday by any means, but trying to create this

parallel between smart money decisions and lessons for the

kids and using candy as a fun, fun currency. Okay, number four

is, how do we teach them the tax? How do we teach them that

money that we make candy that we get on our trick or treating

trip is going to have to have a tax and so maybe lay out an

example where they have 10 pieces, and then two out of

those pieces are going to go into a tax bucket, right? So

that's they don't get to keep 10 pieces of the candy, because

that's how it works in real life. Again, that way, when the

real life comes up and they get a paycheck, a real paycheck,

they're not expected to keep 100% of it, because that's how

it works in real life. So introduce the tax component as

well. Number five, introduce the investing component. So if we

did continue with the three jar approach, you don't have to. You

can break it out any way you want, even use just like a zip

lock bags for this matter. Don't complicate it. If you keep the

candy for a week, right? And whatever it is, 10 pieces, 20

pieces in this bag, and you commit to not eating it. One

week from now, I will put five more candies in that bag, if

that stays there for another week. So week two, I will add

another five pieces of the candy that they like, if it stays

there in week three and week four and so forth. So the idea

is that. Them to all the sudden in a little bit of time to see,

oh, wow, I started with 10 pieces of candy. A week later, I

now have my 10 plus mommy or daddy or grandpa or grandpa are

going to match it up with the five pieces of candy I now have

15. Maybe I can eat one and I still have more than I initially

had, and so forth. So I hope this is actually a really cool

example. And I know that you gotta eat that candy at some

point because it's gonna go back, but let's do it for a

month and see if this concept will sink about All right. This

is how money grows. This is how you actually create real wealth,

even if we're just using the candy concept here. And my last

one for all of it, I couldn't live without it, because it

still kind of circles back to the basic principles of money

management. Is,

how can we instill in them the charitable intentions, right? So

how can they be willing to share and for younger kids, that's a

big, big lesson too, with everything that they've got. So

explain to them, right? And hopefully, if you prefer, maybe

follow the order that I'm describing these steps, and

because you can kind of build on, hey, we are going to grow

the money or slash the candy by five pieces next week. And so

since you have more, could you share one piece of that or two

pieces of that, because you're going to still get more than you

initially started. So I know that, or maybe you introduced

the concept of kids that didn't have the opportunity to have a

costume and go trick or treating. Now that's a good

option for them to share, right? That you know, that particular

candy, or whatever it is, any other you know, Halloween

related kind of thing. So those are my six ideas that I've got

for this exciting holiday. I'm starting to enjoy it more and

more as Liam grows up, and really trying to, like, find

creative ways, not just to, you know, go the traditional route

of, like, blowing money on costumes and and simply just

eating candy until you, like, pass out. Let me know what

you're doing with your kids for this Halloween season and the

next couple of weeks. And how do you keep them engaged and

creative, and still, you're introducing these lessons for

their finances. So I hope this could become a tradition for

your family, so that maybe try some things this year and then

keep on going. But I'm really liking that the currency that we

presented here, and yeah, chocolate candy sounds like a

lot of fun. All right, money bosses, that's all I've got for

you today until next time. Remember you are the bosses of

your own money.