H&R BLOCK: DOLLLARS AND SENSE

How Do You Talk To Your Kids About Money? Step 1: Don’t Talk!

You recognize the need for your adolescent to learn how to manage money and you are committed to tackling the job. So where do you start? If you want to see your teenager’s eyes glaze over, just sit them down and break into one of your lectures. You could give them some unsolicited advice: “You know what you need to do is…” Or if you want to initiate a yawn and a here-we-go-again-mumble, you can warn them about the dire consequences of financial ignorance “If you are not careful…” If you would rather watch them start nodding off you can start with: “When I was your age…”

While there is a time and place for lectures, advice giving, and warnings, studies have shown that these techniques are not very effective strategies for helping most teenagers learn or change their behaviors (and adults for that matter). As a matter of fact, unsolicited advice is most often met with resistance and a mountain of “yes, buts,” or perhaps even worse “okay” (seeming to comply but with no follow through). This is especially true with teenagers who are developmentally hardwired to question authority.

The ancient Greek philosopher Socrates must have arrived at this conclusion centuries ago. His method of teaching did not involve lecturing at his students. Rather, his technique was to ask them questions to initiate the learning process. The questions, of course, were strategic and designed to facilitate discovery. This method of teaching approaches the learner in a much different way. It has since been termed the Socratic Method, and is used by many effective teachers today. In terms of discussions around money, a great place to start is with The Million Dollar Question (link to article with same title) or with a question like: “How do you think wealthy people become rich?” This question will elicit your teenager’s core beliefs about money. Whether you are conscious of it or not, you have passed down some of your core money beliefs to your children through your words, your silence, your stories, your actions, and your non-actions. You may be surprised to hear some of your attitudes about money or those of your partner or family come spilling out. Follow-up clarification questions such as “So you believe that all rich people got that way by taking advantage of others?,” or “So most rich people got that way by winning the lottery?” will encourage deeper thought, self-reflection, and discovery.

So don’t talk to your kids about money--at least not right away. Instead, ask them to share with you what they already know. Hold off on giving advice and instructions, and just ask questions, listen, reflect back what you hear them saying, and ask for clarification. If you spend time listening, you are not only modeling good communication skills, which your teenagers may emulate someday, they will also be much more receptive to what you have to say. If you do a good enough job of listening, they may even begin to ask you for the information you wanted to give them in the first place. They may even surprise you with what they already know. So first, listen.