The story of KidsSave™ begins with frustration. A lot of things begin this way.
Our youngest son was having a difficult time seeing the value of saving his
money. As parents, we consider the ability to spend and save wisely a necessary life
skill and our son was lacking in it. So, using an Excel Spreadsheet, we
showed him what could happen to his money over time if he didn't spend it and
was receiving 10% interest per month. Now, we know that 10% interest per
month is quite a bit, but after seeing the graph generated for saving over
several months he was a believer! He realized he would end up with more
money even if he never added a single penny to his original amount.
We were so impressed with the power of our little demonstration that we
thought it would be great if other kids could experience the same revelation of
saving money that our son had. So we began our quest to create a parent-
and kid-friendly savings program that would not only help kids save
money but help them learn how to set and maintain savings goals. Our overarching
mission: to help parents help their kids develop good life-long saving and
spending
habits.
It's been a number of years since we began our little project, but the final
result has been extraordinary. Not only have both of our children
developed healthy savings habits, but they both understand the value of money.
In this climate of ever-increasing debt, we hope to turn the focus back on
saving and spending wisely. We believe we are beginning to accomplish
that.
By the way, we have reduced the 10% in interest per month much to our
children's disappointment. But KidsSave™ was such a success in motivating
them to save that it was well worth the few extra dollars we put out in the
beginning. And to this day their favorite part of the program is our
What If? section which gets them excited about what their account value will
look like in the future.
As to the name of our company, Kidnexions, it embodies what we hope to
achieve...connections between what kids learn and their everyday lives.
From all of us at Kidnexions we wish you success as you help your children
develop healthy life-long savings habits.
Karyn Hodgens has a BA in Child Development, a Masters of Arts in Education
with a Specialization in Elementary Mathematics, and a multiple subjects
teaching credential. Her passion is designing real-world lessons that
resonate with kids and their interests.
John Hodgens has a BS in Electrical Engineering. He is currently a
software engineer committed to designing software applications that help make
teaching science and math concepts easier.
Kidnexions is a member of the Association of Shareware Professionals.
