Schools and teachers play a major role in educating the next generation of consumers. It is therefore important that teachers feel ready to include financial literacy in their teaching.
Our surveys clearly indicate that children handle money regularly. Fortunately, most of them also think it would be interesting to learn about money. Similarly, parents generally think that schools should teach children how to develop a healthy attitude towards money. Thus, we have designed our initiatives for children so that they can be used in schools.
Teaching Financial Literacy
To help prepare teachers to include financial literacy in their teaching, we developed the Teaching Financial Literacy Web site. It is a free, unbranded, interactive site that is intended to support and motivate math teachers as they present financial literacy in the classroom. The site is aimed mainly at teachers of 5-15 year old pupils.
At the site three small tutorials give examples on financial touch points in the lives of children and youth, teaching tips, financial literacy as a part of the national curriculum, stats and basic knowledge on financial issues. Through these tutorials we hope that the teacher will be inspired, motivated as well as feeling better equipped to include financial literacy in teaching. On the site we have also made available articles with similar information for teachers that would like prints as well as interactive elements showing different stats.
The site was developed and ready for launch in 2009 and will be rolled-out to pupils and teachers in Denmark, Finland, Sweden, Norway and Northern Ireland in 2010.
Teaching Financial Literacy was developed in co-operation with external specialists in education and mathematics from universities as well as teachers. The initiative is supported by an extensive study of math teachers’ attitude towards teaching financial literacy. Some 96% of the teachers find it relevant to teach 10 – 15 year olds about personal finances, and 88% think it would be a good idea if a relevant, non-commercial course was available to them. In 2010 we will further implement these initiatives on our markets.
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Last updated January 25, 2010