When teaching my children to manage money, I encourage them to save 10% of all the money they get for the charity. Then we talk about different possibilities.
They are very fond of the animals, so their first choice is giving to local animal shelters.
When we are going to buy the food for our bunnies, they give all the pennies, we are collecting in a special jar, to collection box in the store.
We also donate clothes, toys and school supplies.
I donate blood regularly and we talk about it a lot.
We were at the fair yesterday and there were the clown doctors, promoting their activities at the children hospitals. Anja (my oldest) immediately noticed they were selling red noses and of course I bought 2 of them. They make all kind of faces with them and when we came home, Anja gave me her money for the noses. She said she wants to give her charity money for the Clown Doctors. Boy, I was proud. It was actually the first time she volunteers to give money by herself without me encouraging it.
Encouraging charitable action benefits the children themselves. It:
- Helps teach empathy
- Shows children that their actions can have a positive impact
- Helps connect children to their (local, national, or international) community
- Helps children better understand and cope with unpleasant events
Do you encourage your child to give some money to the charity? Does he/she volunteers in different charitable actions?
I highly recommend these books to help you raise giving children:
And of course, consider making a donation to the Clown doctors:
