Are your kids good at saving?

When I was about six I saw a Mickey Mouse book in a local newsagents. The book cost 80p, an enormous sum at that age (this was *cough cough* years ago) which might as well have been £800. I asked my parents to buy it for me and my dad said: ‘I tell you what. I’ll give you 10p a week pocket money. If you manage to save it for four weeks, I will give you the rest.’ It was quite a challenge, but every week I put 10p in coppers and pennies (and probably ha’pennies, who remembers them?) into my piggy bank and tried not to spend it on sweets. Four weeks seemed to drag but finally I’d saved 40p. My dad gave me the remainder and took me to buy the annual which was one of my favourite books ever – and partly because I’d saved  up for it myself. I read it until the pages fell apart. So I’m a firm believer in encouraging kids to save from an early age. KidStart recently launched the Save a Million for UK kids campaign, asking you to share your best money saving ideas (and be in with a chance of winning a cool £1k!).  But they want to hear your kids’ ideas, too. You can email them directly to [email protected]. And if you want to leave your children’s ideas in the comments below, too, I’m going to give the boy and girl who come up with the most inventive suggestions for saving their pocket money these brilliant think pink  money boxes. They even come with a key, which will make them irresistible for little savers. written by Liz Jarvis