I'm a special education teacher and author in Georgia, and my wife is a stay-at-home mom to my two young daughters - Ava, age 5 and Ella, 2. We don't make a large salary so we have to be frugal with our money. We are trying to pass on our values to our children. 

Ava gets an allowance every week for chores she does. We check each chore off on a daily basis and at the end of the week Ava gets paid for doing these chores.

Ava has three jars - one labeled Savings, one Give Away and the other Spending. Upon getting paid, she first puts some of the money in the Give Away container, then Saving and finally Spending (she knows the correct order). Ava knows what the money in each jar represents.

When we are out at a store and she sees something she wants to buy, she'll often say, "When we get home I need to see if I have enough money in my Spending jar to buy this." In addition, she is starting to learn the value of money. Just the other day we were at the store and Ava had around $30 to spend (she just received some birthday money). She saw a stuffed animal that she liked. She asked how much it cost and it was around $20. We then walked around a little more and she saw a doll that she liked and asked how much it was. My wife told her it was $10.

We could then see the wheels start turning and eventually Ava realized that she could buy two dolls for the price of one stuffed animal. I thought this was a great lesson for her and she is beginning to understand how money works.

Ava uses the money in her Give Away jar to help others. She has bought a gift for a child that lost a parent and canned food for needy people. A few months ago Ava said something that made me so happy. After putting money into each container she said that she had enough money in her Spending and Saving containers and wanted to get more in her Give Away so she could buy a ball for her sister. I was so proud of her.

She is now of the age that she has started to notice that some of her friends have more materialistic things than she does. We explain as best we can to her why this is so, but it definitely made me feel good to hear her say that she wanted more money to give something away rather than buy for herself.

I feel that these jars have helped my 5-year-old develop a concept that many older children and adults do not grasp. I hope that by learning this now she will continue this practice later in life.