Basic Money Management Ideas that Might Change Your Life

Here’s how one retired teacher found success in his passion for financial literacy education.

Jon, a retired teacher, wanted to know more about educating people on basic personal finance principles, but it had been a few years since he’d been in the classroom.

He wanted to focus on young adults just entering the workforce, but he still needed to nail down a few important elements such as setting goals and tracking the outcomes.

By talking to a few local community colleges, he found out that young adults know they need to learn basic personal finance skills, but most colleges don’t offer it due to political complications.

He wanted to teach young adults the basic money management skills and concepts they would need. Since time was limited, he would be happy if they just learned the material in the first phase. Ultimately, he wanted to affect behavioral and situational change.

Now that Jon’s objectives and vision were defined, he could choose the best way to deliver it.

Since these were young adults, he went with a timeline-based system in order to give them a structured learning environment. Delivery would be a mix of online and in-person instruction.

Next, he had to choose what areas of personal finance to teach. First and foremost, young adults without any background in financial literacy needed to know how to budget and save.

Because the program would only be one month long, he decided to focus on only those two basic money management principles, which he considered to be the most fundamental skills.  He also planned on providing money management worksheets and access to online training to help further their education.

Now that he knew what to teach and who to teach it to, he needed the right curriculum. He wanted learning principles that were based on evidence, designed by a team of diverse experts. Young adults tend to be real-world oriented, and Jon knew they’d respond to practical lessons that lead to action in their lives. Just-in-time learning would also be valuable to the students, since their needs will be diverse and they’ll want immediate answers.

Even though Jon had plenty of teaching experience and would have his financial literacy educator certification before the program launched, he know he wasn’t ready to conduct his first class on his own. He would need experienced help to show him the  ropes but he knew that he wanted to include money management games and hands-on lessons.

Much to his delight, Jon found an NFEC Certified Financial Education Instructor with experience teaching young adults.

Of the 45 students who registered for the class, 39 completed the program, a full 84. Jon was thrilled at the interest level and engagement. He eagerly put the data into a useful format that would help him gain funding and grow.