You know what it is. That's right. It's time to talk money with your money nerd and financial coach. Now tighten those purse strings and open those ears. It's the Money Talk with Tiff podcast. Hey, everyone. I'm so excited because I have Anthony Delany on the line and Anthony's here to talk to us about a demographic, ages 4 through 8 and kids stories. So. Hey, Anthony, how are you? I'm doing great, thank you.
Yeah. So thank you so much for the work that you do trying to teach financial literacy to kids because I know it's rough. However, I think you found the hidden formula. So what made you decide to write kids books around financial literacy? Well, I would say I hope I found the hidden formula. I think we're all trying to figure out the hidden formula when it comes to kids, but I've been a financial Planner for about 20 years and I've worked with families pretty much that entire time.
So I've seen a lot. And I currently have a 15 year old and a 13 year old. So gotten to see it as a professional and also as a parent. And what I've discovered is that, yes, the age old question always, how do I talk to my kids about this? And so forth. And what I found is that it's really hard to talk to kids about money because kids don't make money and they don't necessarily understand it because they don't have any value associated with it.
So really the best way for kids to learn about money or money matters is through experiences themselves. So I discovered that one of the best ways to kind of introduce those lessons is through books or children's picture books specifically. If we kind of think back to when we were growing up, we learned a lot of our kind of things that we keep in the back of our mind from stories that we remember, Dr. Seuss books or whatever it might be that just really stuck.
And what I found is that when it came to writing kids books, books rather than having adults tell children what to do or have a lesson that's really obvious inside of a book, what we want to do is give an experience inside of a kid's picture book where maybe siblings are experiencing something or friends are experiencing something, and as a child reads it, they can kind of empathize and think about how would I react in that situation.
And then all we have to do is just tie money into or tie a financial lesson into that experience that the kids are seeing. So long answer to your short question. No, but it's perfect because I Know, as a parent, I tell my kids what to do. I try to tell them what to do, and I try to, like, you know, explain different money principles and things like that. And like you said, sometimes they just don't get it. However, they love picture books and reading picture books.
So I love that you figured out that, okay, if we center these stories around learning something from a friend or someone, peer level, then we can get this across a little better. So just as an example, the first book that I wrote, actually with the help of my daughter, she's one of those kids that just doesn't go to sleep at night, and I would write these stories during the evening hours. So she came down and we decided to write a children's picture book together.
And we used a principle from back in the day called the Marshmallow Study. Not sure if your listeners are familiar with it, but the idea is in this book. This book's called Dash and Nikki and the Jelly Bean Game. And what happens in the book is a brother and sister wake up one morning and they find a letter waiting for them, and it invites them to play the jelly bean game.
And they come downstairs and there's a giant jar of jelly bean sitting in the center of the table, and there's two plates and a note. And basically the way the game works is they each get 10 jelly beans to start off the day. And for every hour that they can resist 5 or that 10 more jelly beans stay on that plate, that they get five more. So in this case, the brother is very competitive and likes to win. So he says he covers up his jelly beans so he doesn't see them and just lets them sit.
And as the day, as each hour passes, five more and five more, and his pile continues to grow, whereas his sister is a little bit more impulsive and after about two minutes, decides to eat her jelly beans right away. So in the story, the parents are there in the beginning, but after that, we don't really see the parents throughout the day. All we see are these plates where one child sees their pile growing and the other child just has an empty plate there.
And if that was a story by itself, it would be a terrible story. But we can already, for the parents out there, we can already kind of see the financial lessons being incorporated where delayed gratification. If you set aside your money and allow your investments to grow, they'll get bigger for you. Putting a plate on top of the jelly beans to hide your money, not putting in someplace where it's easily accessible. So there's lots of little hidden messages that are in the mix.
But the other important part is if you do allow the emotion of, oh, the money's there. I can take it and eat it right now. Or in this case, jelly beans, eat them right now. The aftermath cannot be necessarily what you want to see. Now, there is a twist in the story where later in the day, Dash, the older brother, decides to help out his little sister, and he. He lends her 10 jelly beans and asks her at the end to give her 12. Give 12 back. So he's there to support. He's being charitable.
So there's lots of different components that we can bring in where in the end, both of them win. Both of them. Actually, she may have had a little bit of struggle starting off, but working together, they were able to both succeed in the game. So it's a brother sister component. It's just a lot of simple lessons that aren't about the specifics about money.
It's not about trading or investing or the things that are a bit more complicated, that we don't really want to introduce those concepts until kids get into maybe middle or high school. But for those elementary school years, those initial years, we just want to introduce those foundational principles to kids so when money does come into the mix, they're prepared. I love it. I love it. And I also love that little hidden message, too, where he's getting interest on that. Yes, exactly.
It grows for you, it works for you. Right? He's like, I'll lend you 10, but you gotta give me back 12. So, yes, there's a charitable component, but it is kind of some skin in the game, I guess you could say. It's saying that if I give this to you, you need to make sure that you don't just eat these two, because you're going to need to pay back in some components. So, yeah, it's been a fun process.
And I can tell you that for the children that have read the book, there's a page on it where you see, as the day's passing, how the two plates look. And that. That's. That page seems to really resonate with kids because they just can imagine how they're feeling as one pile is growing and the other one's empty. And they're trying to imagine where they would be in that position. So fun stuff. Yes, yes. It sounds like.
Like, it's very fascinating how you're describing these books because I'm like, so much thought has gone into putting together the lessons, putting together the examples, who's the characters Very interesting. The odd thing about money is that a lot of kind of the ways we approach life in general can also apply to money.
So if we kind of build those foundational principles, just like when you grow up, your parents teach you to brush your teeth, to eat properly, to take care of yourself, the finance world is kind of the same where if we can build those kind of repetitive patterns really early in the game, it's just much, much easier later in life. Absolutely.
And you know that delayed gratification you mentioned earlier, like I tell people all the time, I feel like that's one of the biggest things that has helped me on my financial journey. I will share with you also that as a financial planner, one of the questions or issues that I've seen over two decades of helping families for adults is that the biggest thing that prevents them from actually achieving financial success is fear of judgment.
They fear that they come in and say, one of the things I often hear is, please don't judge me for this decision I made. And sometimes they're scared to ask people for help because we don't always know the answer when we get started. And that fear is something that doesn't start as soon as you become an adult. That fear is something that can start as when you're a kid.
So I think that an important thing, my fifth book actually goes into that specific topic of fear of judgment, where when it comes to parents and kids, one, we want to teach the kids lessons, but we also want to be mindful of how we react to kids when they succeed and also when they fail. The fifth book is called Akash and Mila and the Big Jump. And once again, it has nothing.
It doesn't mention money at all in this book, but it talks about how two friends are trying out their first gymnastics class, and they're all excited going in. They're ready to go, ready to try out new things. And one of them, they go into a class together and one of them jumps off of a springboard and lands on his face and is completely embarrassed. And it's something that every parent, every child can relate to. They know that feeling of just, I don't want to do it again. I made a big mistake.
I don't want anybody to look at me. I'm not going to talk about it. I just want to leave. But the reality is that if we can take that moment and try to teach kids that, hey, it's okay, we all make mistakes. We all are starting at different points in life. We don't want to judge. We don't have to compare ourselves to where everybody else is, because comparison is the thief of joy. If kids can get over that and can build that self confidence from the beginning, no, it's okay to try and to fail.
And then of course, if friends and siblings can be mindful of that so that when they're, when a friend does fail, instead of making fun of them or ridiculing them, they can try to bring them up and say, hey, you know what? Try again. You can do it. It's those little moments that once again doesn't have to do with finance now, but when they get into making financial decisions, they're a bit more confident in themselves. They're.
They're okay to try things, take risks with investments and things like that. But also if they don't understand something, they know it's okay to ask for help and not feel that they're, they're a lesser person if they do ask for help. Because there's a reason financial planners and so forth exist out there. Yes, yes. And I love that you said that.
That is one thing that I, I have been reflecting on as a parent is watching my reactions to things because I have to realize that this is a little person, it's not a big person. So the life experience and the stuff that I've learned, they haven't learned yet. And so just being more understanding of that fact. So I'm glad that you brought that up from, like, that's confirmation for me. I don't know about any of the other lessons. Yeah, we're all, I'm there. Right?
We all wish we could be that perfect parent or whatever it might be. But we all have our moments where we're looking at the bells and getting frustrated or other things can seep into our lives. But it's not so much what we tell our kids, it's how we react to scenarios that they are seeing. This is how I should or should not react. So it's hard. But that's probably the biggest lesson that we can really pass on.
Rather than saying something to a child, show them how we react in certain situations and not ridicule them when they make mistakes. I love that. I love that. And I feel like that is the perfect mic drop to end this episode. So thank you so much, Anthony, for coming on now. If people are interested in learning more about the books, purchasing the books, or following you, how could they find you? All the books are under a series. It is called the Owning the Dash series.
O W N I N G the D A S H and the concept behind that is on your tombstone you have your birth date and your death date and you have the dash in between. So the idea of taking ownership of your life, there's a long story behind that. Not enough time for this podcast, but if individuals want to learn more or see the other books, they're all available@. Owningthedash.Com I love that what you just said. You are just so full of wisdom. Owning the Dash. Okay, I noted.
But thank you so much Anthony for sharing this information with us. Dropping so many gems in such a short amount of time. I truly appreciate it and the listeners. I will have all of these links in the show notes. So if you didn't catch that, definitely check out the show notes. It's there. Thank you again Anthony and I hope you have a wonderful rest of your day. Thank you so much for having me. Bye. Thank you for listening, joining and being a part of the Money Talk with Tip podcast this week.
You can check Tip out every Thursday for a new Money Talk podcast, but if you just can't wait until next week, you can listen to previous podcast [email protected] or follow TIFF on all social media platforms at MoneyTalk with T. Until next time. Spend wise by spending less than you make a word to the Money wise is always.