Saturday, October 2, 2010

What are we teaching them?

Recently, Joshua and Anna received a dollar each from their great-grandmother. Both bills are currently sitting in our change jar, waiting for me to figure out what to do with them, exactly.

The other day Joshua asked me if we could get him new sunglasses. I refuse to buy him sunglasses anywhere but the Dollar Tree - I am not spending more than a dollar on something that is going to last less than 48 hours. He loves sunglasses, takes them everywhere, wears them everywhere...and subsequently breaks them everywhere. He is harder on sunglasses than my brother Sam is on toaster ovens.

When he asked me for new sunglasses, I decided this might be a good opportunity to teach him about money and making choices. I went and pulled out his dollar bill and sat down to have a deep, one-on-one teachable moment with him. I showed him the dollar and asked him what it was. He didn't know, so I explained it was money, a one dollar bill.

"And what do you think we do with money, Joshua?" I asked.

He thought long and hard for a moment, and then answered:

"Take it to Wal-Mart?"

I admit, I started laughing so hard that we didn't get much farther in the conversation. Oh well, maybe next time!

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