How To Make Your Child With Autism Understand Money

Saving for something you want, staying on your budget, earning your own money are just some of the financial skills that every child should learn. Recognizing and counting money are some basic concepts that they will use in their upcoming life. Even if your child may not be able to live alone completely, but the importance of money management can be life changing.

For children with Autism understanding this concept can be very challenging. Obviously, the extent to which you apply tips totally depends on your kids capabilities. Money skills are an important foundation for independence and confidence. Here are some handful tips and guidelines through which you can educate your child about the importance of money.

Start At Early Stage:

• Start with the basic money skills like identifying various groups of money then move onto things like addition, subtractions, multiplication.
• This is particularly significant for children with autism because if this they can build their maths skills as well as money experience to purchase anything.
• Familiarize yourself with the basics, and make sure you can explain it in a simple way to your child if they approach you with questions about complex financial topics.

Keep It Real:

• Plastic/fake money does not look, feel, or even smell like the real thing
• As it is important for children with autism to educate themselves about what they are learning in real world.
• Try to show them real money (notes and coins) so that they can easily understand the concept of money.
• The more practice they get from handling money matters in real-life, the more confident they will be in future.

Take Your Time, According to their Special needs:

• There is a lot to learn when it comes to money management skills. Representation and repetitive practice is important.
• Try to go with your child’s interest and try to build on the skills from there.
• For instance, if they have special interest in playing video games start encouraging them to save money for purchasing those items.
• Take your child to grocery store for buying snacks or any household item so that they will know what all steps are involved like, selecting a snack, checking the price, deciding if you have enough money, and see if they can pay for those items at the store.
• Use their interests to your advantage.

Teach and Make Them Independent For Transactions:

• A key to helping your kid to be independent is to make them handle money by themselves.
• You can start by giving them money in their hands and allow them to pay to the cashier under your supervision.
• Eventually this will make them independent for going to store on their own.
• Take them to the bank along with you and make them understand how the bank works.

• Help them to organize their monthly income and expenses either on paper or on the computer.

Accept mistakes and Celebrate Progress:

• Just like with any new skill, there will be mistakes along the way.
• When this take place answering neutrally and helping your child learn from the mistake will make them confident and promote for further learning.
• Make sure to acknowledge your child’s endeavors and praise every success.

By helping your child to understand and deal with cash on their own, you’re giving the enormous gift of a more independent future. Each individual is unique and is at different learning stages. Let your child experience responsibility and decisions and they will have pride in their achievements.