4 ways to make giving a family matter

Charitable giving can happen anytime. How can you incorporate teachings about charity into your family life?

Every parent wants to raise children who are kind, giving, and responsible. Here at Charitable Impact, we understand that when youth are taught about giving and empowered to make their own decisions, they’re better able to become engaged citizens who contribute consistently and positively to society. Kindness and generosity have benefits to health, well-being, and happiness. Basically, it’s good for the whole family!

But how do you go about empowering children to start thinking and acting charitably? Here are a few ideas you can do to be more charitable as a family:

Give together

Start a family Giving Group on Charitable Impact, which you can run like your very own family foundation. You can add the money and have your kids weigh in on where it goes. Or, get them to add in from their own funds and they’ll feel even more invested. Studies show that kids are more likely to give as adults if their parents demonstrated the practice at home. 

Mark the days

Take advantage of special awareness days or campaigns to teach your kids about causes. For instance, on April 22nd (Earth Day) you could invite family members to join your Giving Group. Get creative with incentivizing giving: pledge support to the cause if you promise to avoid using electricity, drive less, or reduce your plastic consumption. Studies show that making these little sacrifices in your life for charity can inspire you to actually give more!

Table topics

Pick one night a week where you talk about a notable issue over dinner. Hunger, homelessness, mental illness, cancer: get your kids to think about what their lives might be like if they were affected by any of these topics. What would they want people to do for them? How could they help others? How can they create an impact through charitable giving? You can start local and go global, and the conversation can become a jumping board for learning about the world. 

Powerful pocket money

Learn about our Charitable Allowance and how your family can get take part in this program that boosts charitable literacy among kids. They learn how to direct their giving to make an impact on the causes they care about.

There are many ways to get kids engaged. For example, to earn an allowance that goes to a charity or charities of their choice, kids could do extra chores around the house. You can help guide them to decide which charities should receive the money, along the way learning more about the wealth of causes and charities to support.

Charity really does start at home. Families that give together, have a higher likelihood of raising children who are kind and empathetic.

How does your family make giving a part of everyday living? Share your stories at @wearecharitable. #givetogether

We all have a brighter future that we imagine, so let’s make it happen. Charitable Impact is an online giving platform that makes it simple to give to the causes you care about. When you sign up for a free Impact Account, you can give to all of your favourite causes all from one place. It’s your giving, your way, with our support.