Educators & Parents Agree: You absolutely need these books!
About The Author
Dr. Prakash Dheeriya is a Professor of Finance at California State University-Dominguez Hills. He has been teaching finance and investments for over two decades. Dr. Dheeriya has several publications in the field of financial markets. A frequent speaker at conferences, chambers of commerce and rotary clubs, he has received several research awards, has over 30 refereed publications to his credit.Read more...
Our
books have been recently adopted by an elementary school in Millard
Public School District, rated one of the top 6 % in the nation. The
finance course was created to teach principles of finance using the
series "Finance for Kidz" to high school and elementary school
children . Here is a quote from the lead faculty, David Wilhelm,
the creator of the course, on its successful completion in fall
2010:
Hello Prakash:
Happy New Year! Thanks for your message. The class created last
Fall was a COMPLETE success and both the high school students from
the finance academy and the primary grade students thoroughly
enjoyed it. In fact, one day while visiting the class and
observing the student interaction, I was told by an administrator
that enrollment had to be "capped" at 20 students as the demand
for the class far exceeded their expectations and they had to
"turn away" primary students because of space limitations. Isn't
that amazing?
Anyway, the class was called, "Finance Applications in the Field"
and is now part of the Finance Academy for second year students in
Millard Public Schools. As such, it will most likely be offered
every Fall semester now that the two year academy just completed
its first cycle of students. You should know it was a success and
feel a sense of accomplishment that your books and lesson
materials contributed significantly to help these students better
understand how finance affects their future.
Lastly, my dean has repeatedly expressed a desire for this academy
program to be self sustaining at Millard Public Schools and their
faculty will assume full responsibility for the class instruction,
activities and assessment beginning with the new school year in
the Fall 2011 semester. What this means is I will only be helping
with course development going forward and NOT expected to
facilitate, instruct or evaluate student performance. I hope this
indicates the program is in the sustaining mode and the high
school faculty will now assume full responsibility for the
classes.
I hope all is well with you and apologize for the long e-mail
response but certainly wanted to update you on the outcome of the
class. I leave you with one comment made by a finance academy
student who expressed personal satisfaction on a job well done in
the written assignment which summarized the course. In the paper,
she said,
"Today was our last day with the Cottonwood Elementary
students and we will most likely never see them again. While I am
sad, it gives me great pride knowing our efforts the past 8 weeks
will help them appreciate the important role of finance in their
young lives. We know the students enjoyed the experience with us
for the short time we shared with them and somehow my sadness with
the end of this class is offset by the satisfaction of watching
the progress made of what started as little finance caterpillars
turn into butterflies."
I don't know about you but to me its reading these comments which
is the essence of why I chose a career in education.
Thanks,
David
-- David Wilhelm, Faculty,
Metropolitan Community College, Omaha, Nebraska
"Financial literacy skills are vital to equip our children with the tools they need to make smart decisions about their personal finances, such as balancing a checkbook, making a household budget, and knowing more about stocks, bonds, and home loans. A strong financial literacy education will help our children limit debt, avoid identity theft and maintain good credit. Resources like the 'Finance for Kids' series will help our children learn the basics of personal finance management and prepare them for the responsibilities of adulthood." -- California Assemblymember Ted W. Lieu (D-Torrance)
"I have been given the pleasure of readingFinance for Kids-Volumes 1-20by Prakash L Dheeriya, Ph.D. The individual chapters tell first hand stories of children experiencing finance in their daily lives. Each chapter contains an interactive worksheet or discussion for children to complete with their parents in order to better understand the concepts presented in the chapter. Prakash Dheeriya has done an excellent job explaining adult finance information in words and situations easily understood by children. The young readers learn about opening checking accounts, the understanding of supply and demand, credit, beginning a business, borrowing and lending, and establishing budgets-just to name a few of the topics. The fact that the book is interactive and requires a parent to fully discuss the content of the chapter as it pertains to the child’s family provides both a wonderful learning opportunity for children as well as meaningful time spent with parents on a regular basis. Perhaps if children are exposed to the skills of finance at a young age, they will grow up to be better managers of their own financial business as adults. I applaud Prakash for his insightfulness and great efforts to create the multiple chapters of this book."
--J. Pastell, Parent & Educator
“In my 20+ years in education, which includes teaching economics in public schools, I have never seen any books for young children like Finance for Kids. These books are creative and will be very interesting to students of the proper developmental age. It’s about time that parents and teachers have some tools to teach economics to young children. Finance for Kids fills that need.”
--E. Don Kim, Ed. D, Senior Director - Elementary Schools, Torrance Unified School District
“Personal finance has become so much more complicated than it was 20 years ago and it is more important than ever that young people have a firm grounding in the basics of personal finance and economics. With predatory lenders wooing customers many young people have serious credit card debt and damage their credit ratings which takes years to recover from. Do your children a tremendous favor and use these books to provide them a solid foundation so that they will make good financial decisions”
-- James T. Strong, Dean, College of Business Administration and Public Policy,
California State University Dominguez Hills
“How do you assure that your children make good financial choices as they mature? Start teaching them early with these excellent story books! Dheeriya weaves deep economic principles into simple childhood tales that even your toddlers will grasp easily.“
--Tony Rojko, President of MyMontessori.Net
"How do we teach our children responsibility for their money and for the family’s money? Finance for Kids is a great start. Each book in the series takes you and your child through a step of understanding how to handle money, save money, and make good consumer decisions. These are a GREAT tool to teaching your child about financial responsibility."
--Rev. Rachel Nyback
“Dr . Dheeriya’s book on finance for kids fills a pressing need for a book written in simple story form where small boys and girls who are able to read can identify themselves with characters in the stories and see how it benefits them. Basic topics are presented in an engaging manner, so as to get kids interested in various aspects of finance. Understanding finance principles and their implications, at a very early formative age, will get them interested in saving in all fields including on interest costs all through life, help build up excellent credit and avoid getting into financial trouble. These tremendous advantages will more than compensate for the small one-time price of this book.”
