My second grade daughter is interested in money, the value of money, how to make money. I’ve written about some of her discoveries in the past on my personal blog. We do talk a lot about retail and finance in our house, so some of her interest is a family interest.
When NPR aired a recent segment about the value of coin vs. paper money, my daughter asked politely from the back seat of the car, “Mom can you turn this up – it’s really interesting.”
And until yesterday she had not yet opened a bank account. She has a fascination with counting and re-counting her money. I’m not going to say she is a hoarder because she did divide her coin pile in half this winter to buy some gifts for a couple of toy drives. But, she likes to squirrel little bits of money away.
Before yesterday she had a lot of coins and dollar bills saved in a 3×5 card bin, a couple of bills in a purse, some money in her old play cash register. None of which she had completely added together. And she was beginning to get interested in “interest” income and having a bank account of her own. We knew it was time for her to open her own bank account.
When researching Community Bank online for what we needed to do to help her open her account, we ran across the announcement for the Teach Children to Save Day 2012. It was perfect timing. I registered her for the event and we knew she could open her account that day.
She went with her Papa so I didn’t get to bask in her excitement personally. “They let us look at the vault, and I got to put my money in the coin counter, and they let us take an extra piggy bank for Jack!”
She was extremely proud of her certificate with the official signature. “They really even signed the certificate!” And I think she has a better understanding of saving and banking and deposit slips.
I’m really thankful that she had the chance to go and learn with other kids from the community. My Dad was really proud of how smart she is about money. My daughter was amazed that she had $60.70! And she can’t wait till her next chance to make a deposit.
As a consumer this chance to connect with a bank in a friendly fun way – well that means a lot to our family. It makes me want to change banks. It makes me extremely grateful that our Girl Scout account is already located at Community Bank.
Kids savings accounts aren’t as easy to come by these days. Larger, national banks, don’t often offer this service anymore. At Community Bank the “Acorn” savings account allows children under the age of 18 to open an account with a guardian: Minimum balance of $10, Interest on all balances of $.01, Monthly Statement, and no monthly maintenance fee.
That’s fantastic!
My only regret is that I didn’t know what a great activity this was before yesterday. I could have alerted folks early so that more folks could have gotten in on the action (so to speak). As it is, I will be sure to alert you EARLY next year so that you can participate.
