The other night I was reading my kids one of the Little House on the Prairie books. One scene mentioned that at dinner, children were meant to be seen and not heard. My children were incredulous. What do you mean they weren’t allowed to talk?

A tiny part of me thought, “Wow! I wonder if it’s too late to implement that in our household.” I mean, if they can’t talk, complaining about dinner wouldn’t be an option either.

Obviously we’ve yet to hit the Eat Dinner As A Family And Share Your Day phase of our lives. My girls are young, but I’m confident it will come. It has to, since eating dinner as a family prevents everything from ADD, failing school grades, drug use and acne.

But reading Little House on the Prairie reminded me—have you noticed the blurring of lines between adults and kids these days? Back in the old days when products were made to last, there was a clear distinction between what was intended for adults and what was for children. Children had toys and adult had…well, things that kids didn’t have.

Kids didn’t have stereos or phones. And their clothing was entirely different from that of adults.

Today parents and children often have the same things. iPods, cellphones, Uggs and computers are just a few examples. And if you walk into the girls department (remember, that means 6 years old and up) you’ll find almost the same clothing you’ll find in stores meant for adults – skinny jeans, jeggings and ankle boots.

It works the other way too. Games used to be for kids. Now adults are just as likely to play the Wii or Playstation as the kids are to play it. And both kids and adults are reading Harry Potter and The Twilight Saga. This all happens whether the adults have kids or not.

And then in the midst of it all – because this blog isn’t about how we are raising the next generation – I began to think about banking.

Most kids don’t have a checking account or a credit card. I know, I know – credit cards are a taboo subject these days for students. But the reality of the situation is that the first time they have either one of these products is when they are off on their own, with no one to educate them on how to use the products.

Perhaps we have it All Wrong. Maybe it’s not that we were letting them get credit cards when they were too young. Maybe they were already too old. Maybe we need a checking account, debit card and credit card for ten and up. By then most kids are getting an allowance. It’s the perfect opportunity to teach kids how to deposit money into the account, use the debit card to pay for things and work on balancing their “finances.” (In fact, parents could pay the allowance through the checking account!) The credit card could be used to fund larger purchases.

Right. I’m sure everyone just fell off their chairs. Ten year olds with credit cards?! I’m sure that you are thinking that would drive us into a worse financial crises than the one we are trying to leave. You might also be thinking that I’m slightly delusional.

But credit isn’t necessarily a bad thing. It’s only bad if there is no payment strategy that allows the purchaser to pay off the debt in a reasonable amount of time. For a child it might be a good lesson to purchase an iPod Nano with a credit card and then use a portion of the allowance each week to pay it off.

For example, perhaps the child has received $100 worth of gift cards toward the purchase, but is still short $150. The child can choose to “charge” the rest. If the child receives $10 a week in allowance and dedicates half of it to paying off the debt, it would be paid off in 30 weeks. And the payments could be made through the checking account, helping the child learn about check writing and bill payment.

Is 30 weeks reasonable for a 10 year old? For some it might be, for others it might not be. But that’s up to the parents to help their children decide.

So, the point is financial literacy. Which probably needs to start earlier. If we are letting our children have iPods and Uggs, shouldn’t we teach them how to pay for those things?

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