Childrens’ Books About Money
One year shy of kindergarten, my oldest daughter has become interested in receiving and spending money. She now gets a tiny allowance and with it I’m teaching her about how to save, count, and use currency. These are the first steps in a long-term financial literacy curriculum.
Thinking it’d be nice to get a few age-appropriate books with money themes I asked my mother to do some research. In her internet exploration she found Tennessee Saves, a University of Tennessee program affiliated with the national America Saves campaign. America Saves and its affiliates provide educational materials, support, and advice to encourage individuals and families “to pay down debt, build an emergency fund, save for a home, save for an education, or save for retirement.”
The Tennessee Saves website, and likely those of other America Saves affiliates, has a lot of good educational material, including resources for kids. Among them is a list of children’s books about money (pdf). The list includes dozens of books, among them many for children as young as four. Looks like a good resource.
The Best Books for Children
This post was cited by the Carnival of Family Life: August 2009 edition.
This one is for parents or grandparents of young kids. It comes by way of my mom who sent me a link to The Best Kids’ Books Ever, a July 4, 2009 NY Times Op-Ed by Nicholas Kristof. His list of best children’s books (or series) are, in ascending order of difficulty (with my parenthetical comment):
- Charlotte’s Web (read it),
- The Hardy Boys series (read some),
- Wind in the Willows (read it, don’t recall a thing),
- The Freddy the Pig series (have not read),
- The Alex Rider series (never heard of it),
- The Harry Potter series (read 1-4),
- Gentle Ben (have not read),
- Ann of Green Gables (have not read)
- The Dog Who Wouldn’t Be (never heard of it),
- Little Lord Fauntleroy (not read),
- On to Oregon (huh?),
- The Prince and the Pauper (not a word),
- Lad, a Dog (don’t know it).
My oldest child is just barely mature enough to handle having Charlotte’s Web to her. The rest will wait until she’s older. Meanwhile, I clearly have some reading to do!
Kristof invites readers to post their own ideas of the best books for kids to his blog (there are already over 2,000 comments). Or, you can suggest them right here in a comment. I’ll collect them into a unified comment to his blog later.
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