Joey & Carla Link
June 10, 2026
Summer time is a great time to teach kids responsibility with money. They typically are asking for more of it so they can have fun while out of school. Some kids start thinking of how they can earn money and might even ask you if there are some extra jobs around the house they can do to make money. We encourage this for several reasons.
1.You become their employer. You get to show them what a good employee & employer should look like. Most likely, your child will become an employee or even a boss one day, and this is a prime opportunity to teach them how leaders should treat others, with kindness, fairness, and respect. It will also teach them how to have a good work ethic and attitude while working. Part of this will come by paying them for the job they do. And part of it when they follow through fulfilling their word and commitment by doing the job.
2.Teaching them a good work ethic: once you say yes, you will pay them for a certain job, now comes the hard part, teaching them to follow through with a good work ethic. They are really only looking at the money portion of what they will get, but teaching them that they need to do their best job in a timely manner is difficult when they only want the money and to be done with the job.
For instance, if you give them the job of dusting shelves in your house. Will they take all the things off the shelves and wipe really good, or just swipe at it? Will they put your treasures back where they belong, where you placed them? Or will they be in a hurry and possibly break something? Will they think it all through that much?
They need to memorize and have in mind I Cor. 10:31 “So whether you eat or drink or whatever you do, do it all for the glory of God.” They need to know the work they are doing is not just for you, but as a Christian, they are really an employee of God’s. You want to teach them this kind of work ethic now for when they leave your home and go work for someone else. So they will want to glorify God in their work when they are working outside your home one day.
3.How to spend their money: Most kids are looking to make money so they can spend it on all their desires. But have you taught your kids to save it too? A good question to ask is whose money is it? You want to implant into their minds that God is the one who gave them money. He gave you the idea of giving your child a job. Your kids need to get the idea that all money and wealth they will ever get is a blessing from God. Therefore, they should return a portion of it back to God when they go to church on Sundays. How much is a portion? In the Old Testament God said 10%. We also wanted our kids to learn the responsibility of saving for the future, so we helped them open up a savings account and had them put 40% of what they made into it. When they were ready to buy a car when they were teens, they thanked us for teaching them how to save so they had money set aside in their savings account to buy one.
Another thing that’s fun to try during a family outing or vacation, especially at places like theme parks where kids are constantly tempted by treats and souvenirs, is to give each child the amount of cash you planned to spend on them for the day. Let them know, ‘This is your money for today, and you can choose how to spend it.’ Not only does this teach valuable money-management skills, but it’s also fascinating to watch them weigh their options, make decisions, and sometimes pass up an impulse purchase so they can stretch their money until the end of the day.
We talk about this concept on our recent podcast “#121 “Kid’s Behavior in Public”. Click the title or search Parenting Made Practical in your favorite podcast app to listen!
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Parenting Made Practical Podcasts
Join Joey & Carla for a day at a theme park to see how your kids should behave in public. Whether you are shopping, having a special family day, or enjoying a day at a theme park, we give practical tips on how to navigate kids running off on their own to go on rides, wanting to keep buying expensive food instead of eating what you brought and so much more. We also give tips to help avoid kid’s bad attitudes in public.
Click the title or search Parenting Made Practical in your favorite
podcast app to listen!