Recently I was asked to write a post about one of the major goals of our parenting adventure, teaching our children about money. Once upon a time, we subscribed to a chore based allowance system. We believed we were teaching our 3 older children (13, 9, 5) that hard work earns you big bucks (or at least a few bucks as in their case). It backfired on us. The children believed that if they were asked to do something, it should include a price tag. They got greedy with their time and lazy with their everyday family chores. We heard a lot of disrespectful mouthiness and they lost their willingness to volunteer to help Mom and Dad. We had always told them that if they see something that needs to be done, do it. We had children coming to us saying "Mom, I see that you have been working hard laying up
the applesauce for winter. The floor is a mess, I'll sweep it for 50 cents!"
SOOOOOO not part of our plan. We wanted to teach our otherwise compliant children to work hard, work together, and respect every penny they got, instead we taught them to only take the highest paying jobs and easy money was also easily spent money. My husband and I also noticed the gross amount of
arguing that was happening. They were disrespecting each other and forget about asking one of them to help another with a job. We both felt it was important to teach the children about
tithing, saving and money management. Plus, if they weren't given a regular bit of pocket money, how could we say "Well, maybe you can get that with your allowance" when they would ask us for every little desire. But, the current system was not working, something had to change.
Change it did!! We stopped giving our children the chore based allowance. Instead, we explained that chores were part of life. Even if they weren't part of a family, they would have chores to do that they would not be compensated for. Such is life. They would from that point forward, be expected to cooperate with
prompt and cheerful obedience (a phrase they are being to dislike) whenever asked to do something. They would also be expected to respect each other. Not only were they to refrain from the use of any unpleasant words, they were also required to watch the tone they used when talking to a family member (or any guest, elder, etc.) They would start each new pay period with a "salary" of sorts so they knew they could expect $5.00 with the proper behavior. Any infraction to these rules would cost them a quarter. These new rules have helped so very much. I can't say it's perfect. They are still testing the boundaries, but we are seeing a lot less mouthiness and a lot more eager compliance. They are treating each other a bit better, with less sibling
rivalry. We are still working on the "doing what you see needs to be done" thing. We award this out of the ordinary behavior by lavishing on praise. They soak that up! Better then any dollar we could ever spend!
Questions? Email me at
Oroscowa@yahoo.comBlessings,
KimO
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