Tax day is coming up very quickly! Where is 2015 going? It is hard to believe that we are in the second week of April. My seven year old is smart and inquisitive and she wants to understand everything. So I decided to do a little internet searching and try to effectively explain to her what taxes are.
Explaining Taxes (A Christian Perspective First)
As Christian parents, we like to use the Bible in explaining why we do certain things for our children. We can easily show our daughter from the Bible that as Christians yes, we should pay taxes. Here are a few verses to share with the kids:
- Matthew 17: 24-27 – Jesus paid taxes and encourages taxes to be paid.
- Romans 13 – Paul tells Christians to submit to governing authorities and pay taxes.
Taxes 101 for Kids
Explain to your children that we give the government our taxes to pay for things we all use – like parks, roads, public schools, and police departments. Share with your kids the three types of taxes that are paid to our government:
- income tax
- sales tax
- property tax
Briefly explain to kids that the Internal Revenue Service sets tax rules and gives us forms to pay our taxes to the government. Each person is responsible to pay Federal and State taxes and most get a percentage taken from their paycheck each month to pay taxes. Share with kids that those who don’t pay their taxes are penalized. When too much money is given to the government, there is a return of the money. When too little is given, then you must pay the money.
Tax Activity Ideas:
- Ask your child to draw pictures of things that our tax money may pay for.
- Create a math worksheet asking the child to calculate the cost of items with sales tax added.
- Let kids do the Taxes 101 Word Search Puzzle PDF printable.
right click and open in a new window to print the above jpg image
I think it’s important to emphasize the positive attitude to taxes rather than the negative opinions of most Americans. They make it so difficult! It’s crazy!!!! I work at a library and we have some tax forms. What a nightmare this year! kristiedonelson(at)gmail(dot)com Thank you.
It is a hard time of year for my family too. My husband’s a minister and I am a blogger so taxes get a bit tricky. Ha!
What a great post! I love that you incorporated scripture into this idea – I think we often miss that completely when we talk about taxes. So many people – even Christians – go right into complaining about them. This is such a valuable lesson for kiddos!
Thanks, Gina. Scripture first! 🙂