How do you explain your job to your child?

[simplemama32]

Not your actual duties, but the fact that you leave them for X hours a day to go to this mysterious place called "work." 

DS is almost 3 yrs., and has started asking questions about why I have to go to work instead of staying with him.  I don't want to tell him "it's all about the money," but frankly, it is.  This is not a job I love (although it's a good job and I don't dislike it), it's a paycheck to keep a roof over our heads.

[JudiAU]

*sigh* No advice. My discussion with my three year old backfired and now is anxious about my work, because I said to be apart from him when I was there. (True, actually, because I cried every day for the first year but I never would have said whatever I said/had him internalize it that way).

[laohaire]

Can you take him there sometime? I bet that would help a lot. No, I don't mean take him to work with you for a day or anything, but can you stop by on a weekend morning sometime, or can your husband take DS and pick you up at work once, something like that?

Otherwise, I think it could be a good start to point out other people at work in everyday circumstances. You go to the store with DS, and when you get back in the car you can talk about all the people you saw there who work for the store - the cashier, the stockers, the customer service people, the person who gathers shopping carts. You go to a restaurant, and explain how the waitress works there, and there is a kitchen in another room where other people cook the food you eat. And likewise, you have a job too - if it's an office job you can just say that you help other people at your office.

I work from home, so I didn't have a mysterious disappearence to explain, but I did have to talk to DD about this because she thought that all the workers LIVED at their place of work. So I had to discuss it more than once, explaining that they have families and homes to go to, and they go to the grocery store and probably have a car, etc. I also explain that my boss pays me money for my work, and we use that money to buy food, the house we live in, etc. The money thing is probably going to be harder for our kids than for us - we hardly use cash anymore. Money is so invisible to children now.

[laohaire]

Oh, and I don't see anything wrong with explaining it's about money. That's what I did. My DD knows my boss and I explain that I help him, and in return, he gives us money that we use to buy food, pay the bank for our house, buy gas for the car, and everything else.

[Alyantavid]

I tell my kids that we have to work so that we can buy things.  The depth of that conversation depends on them. 

I don't put my issues with my job on them.  Or the fact that I'd rather not have to work. 

[stormborn]

I've always been matter-of-fact about it; easier maybe because I have a job rather than a career. "I have to go to work to earn money to buy food, electricity, toys, etc."  It's the truth! 

[nina_yyc]

Is there anything wrong with it being about the money?  I am proud to support my family!

My job doesn't entail saving the world or any kind of actual benefit to society, but that's kind of over my four-year-old's head.  If she asks on a given day why I go to work, I tell her it's because I promised my boss and my co-workers I would be there every day, and it's my job.  I tell her the same thing when she asks why her dad goes to work.  We have also talked about earning money for the family and since she started getting allowance she is beginning to appreciate money.  She also knows that mom working means that one day we will get a house with a backyard and she can have a swing set

[ekh]

My almost 3 year old asks me incessantly why I have to go to work. She never asks my husband, as far as I can tell. I've told her lots of things about it...that the "big children" are waiting for me (I teach high school), that we need money to buy food and toys, that it's my responsibility, that I have to go, etc. I've started asking her, now, after the millionth question about work, why she thinks I go to work. She likes to answer her own question and it also lets me know which of the reasons I've given her resonates with her. I would like her to come visit me again at work (she's been there plenty, but not really recently.) I've also started telling her, that when the weather gets hot, I won't go to work again for a while, and she's pumped about that. 

[sparklett]

I took DS (3 yrs.) to my office ( I work from home and have a small off-site office, too) so he could see where I was going each day.  I explained that I work so we could buy things like toys and books.  He really seemed to understand that.  We have talked occasionally about exactly what it is that I do; I'm able to show him tangible results of my job and photos, so he seems to understand that, too.

[CatsCradle]

I've been bringing DD for visits to my office off and on since she was an infant.  She loves coming to the office.  To her, that is more fun than going to the playground, preschool, anything.  She loves visiting my colleagues and going to the cafetaria in the building as well as visiting the pantry on my floor to hot cocoa, etc.  She loves using the supplies in my desk.  Unlike myself, she finds coming to the office a real vacation!

That being said, I'm in the legal profession and so far it has been difficult to explain what I actually do (I'm on the commercial side).  She grasps what her dad does, our neighbors do, her relatives, but it is hard to explain to a 4.5 year intangibles like "negotiation" or "contract writing."  I simply tell her that I read and write a lot.  She seems satisfied with that. 

She's never asked why DH and I work.  Although she does understand the concept that most people work to make money.  This concept has come home a couple times recently when she's asked for something and we've said that she'll have to get a job so she can pay for it.  :)

[LittleGriff]

I tell our 3.5 yr old son, who tells my husband and I every single day that he doesn't want us to go to work, that I need to work so that we can have money for a house and food and toys, etc.

One, that is the primary reason I go to work. If I didn't need money I sure as hell wouldn't be doing this!

And two, none of my adult friends and family understand my job, so I doubt I will have much luck explaining it to a 3 and a half year old. But I definitely will explain that piece of things at some point.

I think understanding money (whence it comes, where it goes) is an important life skill and I see no reason not to start talking about it now. However, I am also very proud of my professional accomplishments and hope to give my children a deeper sense of why I do what I do when they are able to understand it.

My husband told me the other night that he asked DS what he wanted to do when he grows up ... and he answered "make money ... and drive a car." Ha.