Teaching Children About Poverty

Most parents will try their hardest to protect their children from these types of things. They do not want their children to know what it is like to be poor, or to do without certain luxuries in life. Your children need to understand what it means to be without. That is if you really want to raise children who actually care about others. Even though someone is poor or has less than others it does not mean that they can not have a happy life. What exactly does poverty mean? It is defined as the lack of money or material resources. But this is not something that is easy for many people to recognize, especially children. Did you know that some people claim that they learned how to be poor? What that basically means is that they learned to do without certain things. Could your children learn to do without? Or would it become a sudden realty shock for their system.

In the United States eight out of every ten families are poverty stricken. Most of them do have a roof over their heads. They also have television sets, and washing machines and even a car. But when they compare themselves with their neighbors or coworkers they feel a lot less adequate. If you take the time to analyze exactly what poverty means in this country to your child, they may be able to understand, and have compassion for others. It will also help them to learn to appreciate what they do have, and what you as parents have worked so hard to give them. Even the richest person in the world can still be unhappy.

For example most families who have large amounts of money have to make a lot of other sacrifices in their lives. For example the parents barely get to see their children, or their spouse. They do not even get much time to spend in their big fancy houses, or driving their very expensive cars. This type of experience is very common among many rich people. The bottom line is that they are just not happy with what they have. In the Untied States suicide is the second most widespread cause of death among adolescents, and many of these come from wealthy families. They must have really suffered a vast amount of mental torment in order to be driven to do such a thing.

This does not mean that those who are poor do not have their own problems as well, because they do. But which would you prefer your children grow up to be a rich man with heartbreaking family problems or a poor man whose wife loves him and whose children respect and obey him. Sometimes whether you are rich or poor does not really matter. It is more important to teach your kids the real value behind each.