Reading Time: 2 minutes

Teach Your Kids About Budgeting With Pizza

The idea of budgeting can feel big and complicated, but you can make it easy for your kids to understand using a pizza (and you get to eat the pizza).

Kids already know that a pizza only has so many slices. Once the slices are gone, they are not coming back. This makes it the perfect way to show how money works in real life.

Here is how you can use a pizza to explain budgeting in a way that makes sense.

First off, order or make a tasty pizza (Yum).

Now, don’t gobble it down like normal.

Explain to your kids that you are going to talk about money and budgeting using the pizza.

Start by placing the pizza (or a drawing of one – but that’s less fun) in front of your kids.

Explain that the whole pizza is the money the family has each month.

Every slice represents something the family must spend money on.  Maybe prepare a short list in advance: Electricity, transport, cell phones, internet, food etc.

Most pizzas have between 8 to 10 slices

Tell you kids that each slice will be used to “pay” for these expenses.

Now the fun part. You get to eat the slices. Maybe each kid gets a slice while you carry on chatting.

When a slice is removed and eaten, that part of the money is gone. This helps kids see that money has limits and needs to be shared carefully.

Next, let your kids decide what the remaining slices will be used for.

They might choose treats, entertainment or something fun. Then show them that these slices can only be added if there are slices available.

If the pizza is finished and you still have items left on your list, then this teaches them a good lesson. If you manage to assign a pizza slice to each of the items on your list then that’s also great. Either way they will learn.

one more lesson you can teach them

Saving…

You could encourage the kids to save some pieces for a snack later and to represent setting aside some savings each month.

When kids can picture their own money as slices, it becomes easier for them to plan, save and make better choices.

And…you all get to eat pizza.