I’m a firm believer that the most important lessons that we teach our children should be useful to them throughout their lives. That’s why I encourage that personal finance for high school math is essential to a child’s education.
High-level high school math classes do not determine your child’s future, nor does not completing them hold them back from their future. In fact, their success depends on learning about personal finance in high school.
Personal Finance for High School Math
More than likely, you’ve already taught your children about budgeting before their high school years. However, if you have not, this is the time to do so. In addition, there are a few other skills that they need to learn regarding personal finances.
- Checks and Bank Accounts
It may seem unnecessary to teach your children about checks today, but it really is. There are still occasions where paper checks are issued or given. So, they will need to know how to sign their name in cursive in order to cash or deposit them.
You also need to teach them how to properly fill out a check and balance a bank account using a register. These may be skills that are “on the way out”, but they are needful at times.
This bank simulator from NGPF is a helpful tool for students who don’t yet have their own bank accounts. I do recommend teaching your high schoolers how to use a paper register to document their paychecks and purchases in addition.
- Stock Market
The only funds I have in the stock market are in a 401K from a job I held in the past. Both of my kids wanted to learn about the stock market during their high school years, though, so I researched and found a resource that they both enjoyed and learned a lot from.
In this day and age, on social media, they’re going to run into a lot of “advice” about what to do with their money to set them up best for their future. I believe it is essential that we ensure that they’re actually learning about the stock market – how it works, the risks involved, etc., outside of social media “advice”.
I haven’t used this particular resource, but for those who enjoy online games, The Stock Market Game might be useful as well.
- Filing Taxes
Yes, it only happens once a year and the online submission format is so much easier than the paper forms we had to fill out growing up. Still, this is a personal finance skill that our children will need to use once a year.
My daughter has had the opportunity to help teach a friend of hers how to do her taxes because she wasn’t taught how to in school or by her parents. This instance made me very thankful that I took the time to teach both of my kids how to file their taxes, enabling them to teach others how to do their own.
TurboTax offers a free tax-simulation that you can use as part of your child’s personal finance for high school math course here.
If you have looked up or were to look up the recommendation for high school math courses, more than likely, it would not include personal finance. Instead, you’d probably find Algebra 2, Geometry, Calculus and Trigonometry.
I disagree with these high school math recommendations greatly. The average person will have no use for any of them in their lifetime.
You’ll also find advice stating that your child will need at minimum 3 of those courses in order to be accepted to a four-year college.
I’m here to tell you that this advice isn’t correct in every instance. Both of my children were accepted to a private four-year college with only 1 of the high school math courses I listed above.
There are exceptions to this topic, to be sure. If a child is planning to attend college to be an engineer, a biochemist or an architect, then the math courses above would be needful.
While it is impossible to know exactly what the future holds for our children, most of the time, before the high school years, a parent is able to recognize if their child is going to be interested in or capable of pursuing a future/degree in a mathematically challenging field.
Even then, just because a child is capable or interested doesn’t mean that they want to cover the high-level mathematical courses in high school.
Guess what? That’s ok! It won’t hurt their future if they need them later on in life. There are countless online courses and classes available or community colleges that they can attend should they, as an adult, want to pursue a math-related field.
My advice for high school math is this. Freshman year: Pre-Algebra. Sophomore year: Algebra 1. Junior year: Geometry. Senior year: Personal Finance.
It’s what I did in high school and what both my kids did. I opted not to go to college; however, I am a successful business owner. My kids were both accepted to a private four-year college, one of which now has a master’s degree in psychology.
Personal finance is the most important high school math class that a child can take, in my opinion. No matter what the future holds for any of our children, they need to know how to handle their finances.
If we do not take the time to teach them how to do so while they’re in our home, they are likely to struggle with money when out on their own.
This is one of those instances when not following the recommendations for high school is needful.
Personal finance for high school math is a necessity. The success of our children’s futures depends on it.
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