It is never too early to teach kids how to save money. I found a product that will help me teach my daughter how to save money at an early age called the Money Savvy Pig. The Money Savvy Pig is not your traditional piggy bank. The Money Savvy Pig is a piggy bank with four chambers, one for each of the four money management choices a child should be taught from the time they are small–Save, Spend, Donate, and Invest. The Money Savvy Pig is a money management tool for children ages 4 and above.
By using the Money Savvy Pig, parents can help their children learn important basic personal finance concepts and skills such as short and long term goal setting, the value of money, and the power of investing. The Money Savvy Pigs are great for your own children or as gifts for other children. There are several colors to choose from: blue, red, pink, green, purple, and platinum. (Warning: Not intended for children under 3 years of age. Handle bank loaded with coins carefully. If dropped, heavy objects can break or cause injury or damage. Coins or stoppers represent a potential choking hazard and should never be put in the mouth. My daughter is 2 and I allowed her to “test the product out” with careful supervision.)
When we received the Money Savvy Pig, I was a little concerned as to how my daughter was going to react to it. I thought it would be too hard for her to understand how to use it. She is two and the product isn’t recommended for children under 3. I decided to allow her to test the product out with careful supervision. As soon as I took it out of the box she was curious and excited about how to use it. I sat down with her and explained the four chambers: save, spend, donate, and invest.
We took out our can of change and started placing one coin into each chamber at a time. As we fed our pig with money, I asked her to repeat each word for me. Although she is still too young to understand what each word means, this pig is a great teaching tool. As a parent, this makes it easy for me and as she gets older I plan to talk more about what each word means until she grasps the four money saving concepts. When each chambers get filled, we will do exactly what it says to do. For example, if the “donate” chamber fills up, we will either donate to a charity, to our church, or to someone in need.
When the “save” chamber gets full, we will put the money into her own personal savings account and “invest” in her college account. We will “spend” on items she may have on her “wish list.” The Money Savvy Pig makes it easy for me as a mother to be able to teach my daughter the importance of each basic personal finance concept. My daughter had a blast “feeding the pig” as we called it and didn’t want to put the piggy away! I do recommend this product to you. Check out the photo and the video of my daughter placing money into our Money Savvy Pig. You can see in the video that we “missed” the save chamber, but she’s 2…that can be expected!
Disclosure: Money Savvy Generation provided me with one Money Savvy Pig for review purposes. All opinions are my own. Money Savvy Generation is also providing one Money Savvy Pig as a giveaway for one of my readers.