Sunday, April 18, 2010

He's Getting It

We've been trying to teach Troy the importance of his decisions as we've been working on our commissions system. There are so many basic things that they have to learn. It was awesome when I recently saw one of these basic life lessons sink in with Troy.

Ever since we started going to the zoo a couple years ago Troy has been asking to use one of those machines where it smashes a picture in to a penny. We've always been able to talk him out of it. When he started on commissions, I decided that it was his choice. If he wanted to spend his $0.51 on a smashed penny, that was up to him.

We were walking through the amphibian house when we came to one of those things where you can put coins in and watch them spin down (or race another coin). I offered him a penny and he froze. He loves doing this, so I was really confused. He had this puzzled, almost panicked, look on his face. When I asked what was wrong he said, "But I really want to put my penny in the machine outside." It occurred to me, he was thinking that if he put his penny here he wouldn't have one for his penny picture outside. Opportunity costs!!! He gets it!!!

Luckily, I was able to show him he had more than 1 penny in his money pouch, so he got to enjoy both. He was thrilled!!! It seems like such a basic thing to a grown up, but for a child this is a HUGE realization. He's been exposed to the idea before, but it's nice to see him being able to apply it to money too.

1 comment:

K E Fleck said...

Way to go, Troy! (and good job Mom and Dad for being good examples)

Our family collects those smashed pennies, too. Even if it costs $2 plus the penny to make one, it is usually the least expensive souvenir (and doesn't take up much space)

Happy Tuesday!

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