Kids & Money: Learning Financial Lessons Early

Experts say now is the perfect time to teach children how to manage their spending and savings, and high-tech tools can help. NBC's Dan Scheneman reports.

(NBC News) — With so many parents spending more time at home with their kids, it may be the perfect time to talk about spending.

Ted Rossman of Bankrate.com suggests parents start small.

“Giving them a few bucks a week for an allowance could be a good way to teach them about saving, investing, giving charity,” Rossman says.

Another option is teaching kids about the digital economy.

Greenlight is one option.

The debit cards have controls which allow parents to add value and allow or deny some purchases.

“It has built in spending account with debit card and parental controls, you can create savings goals and the kids can visually see how see how close they are getting to their goal,” explains Greenlight co-founder and CEO Tim Sheehan. “Personal finance is often not taught in schools, and and so Greenlight is trying to solve that problem.”

All this may help lead to the most important lesson of all.

“I think a fundamental concept is you can’t have it all – if you spend this much on some item, you are not going to have it for something else,” Ted Rossman says.

In addition to Greenlight, Famzoo and GoHenry offer kids a similar opportunity to save, invest and learn about finances.

Read more here.