While on a trip from Missouri with Linda, my significant other, and her children, we stopped to fill up on gas and get a snack from one of those roadside convenience stores. As we were paying for gas, Linda's son showed up at the front counter with some toy he'd picked up off the shelf and absolutely had to have. (We've all been there a few times.) Linda smiled and said, "Sure, you can get that." He beamed. Another victory! Then she added, "With your own money."
You could hear the mental brakes screeching. Her son retreated into thought, as he walked around the store, weighing the pros and cons of using his own hard-earned cash to buy this item. When it was time to leave, he put the item back on the shelf. "I don't think I really need it," he said, and that was that.
It isn't headline news, but our children are inundated with flashy new toys and other novelties, and they want them all now. If you pull out the cash to buy them, they're happy as clams. Your money is play money to them, but ask them to spend their own hard-earned cash on something and suddenly they are forced to ask the same questions you and I pose all the time as adults: Do I really need this?
More often than not, you'll find your children putting stuff back on shelves. It won't always happen, especially with younger children to whom allowance is still play money, but it will occur more and more often as children start to understand the value of money.
This technique will be especially useful as your children start to work for their money. Working for $5 per hour puts a whole new perspective on a $30 purchase that is going to end up on the floor of the bedroom closet in a week.
On a related issue, in my home we have a rule that kids pay the extra for items with logos. If a good pair of sneakers costs $60, but the Air Jordan basketball shoes cost $100, we're happy to let the children make up the difference. Sometimes they shell out the extra cash; sometimes they don't.
In any event, my children are learning about the true cost of logos and the support of high-profile sports figures, rock stars, and skate boarders whose endorsements make many products so much more expensive. They're also learning just how much more one must pay for a logo – to provide free advertising for a company. Shouldn't they pay us to serve as walking ads for their products?
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 | Excerpted from EcoKids: Raising Children Who Care for the Earth by Daniel Chiras. Copyright 2005 by Daniel Chiras. Excerpted by permission of New Society Publishers. All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher. |
