What is a good age to start teaching my children financial literacy?

Schools don't teach people how to manage money unfortunately. I recall saying this to my brother (who's about to graduate), and he whole heartedly agreed.

You can take a staggered approach.

Start by teaching them the concept of needs and wants, budgeting, and saving. Followed by the fact that money is finite and a hard earned resource. Then, the importance of delayed gratification (so that they will save more). Followed by the importance of growing money to shorten the period they need to wait to reach a certain goal.

I find that kids can understand budget/saving from as young as Kindergarden. You'll probably want to introduce need/wants, delayed gratification in lower primary, and then investing in upper primary, as they develop their maths skills.

Young. Ideally before or when they reach primary 1. It can be simple, like asking them to save for something they really want, putting aside X% of their allowance for savings etc

I intend to start my son when he's young (more specifically from age 3 onwards), and will be designing a whole system of concepts to take him through, starting with small steps. Most importantly, he should have fun while learning it :)

Hi Anon,

Yeps agree with you. I think in general starting as early as 3 or 4 might help. I recently saw some documentary where kids at the age of 3 are tasked to purchase stuff from the supermarket, using real cash.

So in essence, they start to have decision making capability and I believe that's the right time to start.