Diversified Learning Project for Placed Children

As the proverb says, "Give a man a fish and he will eat for a day. Teach a man how to fish and you feed him for a lifetime." Careworkers at Mustard Seed Youth Home (MS Youth Home) not only provide a family-like environment for teens, but also teach teens life skills, such as eating three balanced meals a day, shopping for groceries, cooking, repairing things, keeping a record of spending and saving, doing laundry and washing bedding, cleaning up environment, observing etiquette, and managing emotions, in order for them to be well prepared to live in the real world independently by the time they exit residential care.

On a weekend in last November,  teens took a 6-hour money management class at MS Youth Home taught by Ms. Lin, a social worker at social assistance division of Hualien County Government, and her fellow teammates. Teens wondered why bothered to manage money when they had no pocket money left over. How to teach teens about money management? Put simply, teens had to start by understanding the difference between needs and wants, which was something they might find hard to grasp. Therefore, raising teens' awareness of the difference between the two in their everyday lives was going to be quite a challenge faced by teachers at MS Youth Home.

In the classroom, board games and hands-on activities were used to help teens familiarize with basic money management concepts like savings and investments (stocks and real estate). The 6-hour course covered the fundamental concepts and the fun learning activities made time fly. MS Youth Home planned to provide teens with more financial literacy lessons in 2022 that would help them incorporate money skills in their daily life.