When kids reach the age when they start understanding money a bit — that goods cost money, more money buys more goods, etc., it is a good time to start teaching them about being savvy with money.

This doesn't have to be a serious, gloomy exercise: we can create fun games and little tasks to get them comfortable with money and understand how it is made and managed.

There are several ways to do this:

• Taking kids with us when we go to the supermarket is a good opportunity to help them understand how we pay for things like food, etc. Similarly, we can include them when planning a party for them and their friends. Going over how much snacks we need and thus how much money we should allocate, etc., gets them in the habit of thinking along those lines.
• As kids start getting their pocket money, we could make them a mock "employee" that gets paid every month, with a "contract" that describes their tasks and chores. To track the tasks, we could use a simple wall calendar that they can mark off their completed tasks. This exercise teaches them several things: working to get paid; making this month's "income" last till the next month, etc.
• We can sit with them and help them create a budget for their pocket money: allocating money for different expense categories, tracking the budget (planned versus actual expenses), etc.
• Kids that accompany grown-ups during donation drop-offs get to learn about the concept of helping the needy. Over time, as their pocket money increases, we can get them to include 'charitable giving' as one of their budget categories so that it becomes second nature to them. We can teach them to evaluate charities (walk them through how different charities spend the donations they receive) so that the they get good and selecting efficient charities.
• As kids start saving some of their pocket money and see their little piggy banks becoming heavier, it might be time to introduce them to investing. We could open a bank or an investment account on their behalf, help them deposit a portion of their monthly pocket money into this, and track the investment's growth. This helps them learn how they can 'grow' their money over time.

The ideas above can be done using smartphone apps, on a computer (using shared spreadsheets), or just using pen and notebook.

Summary

These are just some ways we can introduce personal finance concepts to kids. Learning about money without risking much helps kids to be comfortable with personal finance and to make good financial decisions later in life.