CUNA hosts preschool financial literacy session

MADISON, Wis. (5/13/04)--Where does money come from? "Banks" and "cash machines," according to preschoolers CUNA interviewed as part of a project to help parents teach budding consumers about money at home.

CUNA recently hosted credit union and Cooperative Extension educators and charged them with identifying basic money concepts that children should know by the time they enter school. After a peer review, the group will release its recommendations in the fall, along with simple activities parents and day care providers can use to teach the concepts. The free resources will be available to the public, in English and Spanish, by downloading from CUNA's website.

CUNA formed the preschool task force to complement many organizations' efforts to promote financial education in K-12 schools nationwide.

"Children see an estimated 40,000 TV commercials each year. They make their first assisted purchase between the ages of four and six," says Philip Heckman, CUNA's director of youth outreach. "Even if we had the perfect personal finance curriculum in the public schools, children would arrive with fundamental attitudes about money that could affect their financial security for a lifetime. In many cases, children would need to be 'untaught' bad spending habits before they could begin to learn to set financial goals and save for them."

The task force expects its resources will help bring responsibility for financial literacy into the home and encourage parents to lobby for expanded personal finance education in school, and increase parents' awareness of wise money-management skills and proper use of financial services.

Heckman hopes credit unions will become key partners in the preschool financial education project by publicizing the availability of the concepts and teaching activities, and encouraging their use among members and the general public.

The task force was supported by a grant from the National CU Foundation, with additional funds from the Ohio and Texas CU Foundtions. Sharon A. Burns, executive director of the Association for Financial Counseling and Planning Education, facilitated the two-day session.

Task force members are:

• Patricia A. Behal, University of Nevada Extension;
• Judy H. Branch, University of Vermont Extension;
• Rose Evers, Royal Oakland Community CU, Royal Oak, Mich.;
• Carole A. Gnatuk, University of Kentucky;
• Juan Hernandez, consultant to the Texas CU Foundation;
• Sue Helmreich, Ohio CU League;
• Ruth N. Schriefer, University of Wisconsin Extension;
• Lin Standke, CUNA's Center for Personal Finance;
• Celvia E. Stovall, North Carolina State University;
• Erica Tobe, Michigan State University Extension; and
• Marietta Wahl, Northland Educators FCU, Fargo, N.D.

For further information, contact Heckman at pheckman@cuna.coop.

Working on devising activities for parents to use to teach one of the concepts are, from left: Carole A. Gnatuk, University of Kentucky; Sue Helmreich, Ohio CU League; and Celvia E. Stovall, North Carolina State University. (Photo provided by Judy Branch)

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