Part of the 7th grade curriculum in my New Hampshire home town is a “financial living” unit. Now, I’m not entirely sure why they decided it was a good idea to teach a bunch of 13-year-olds how to write checks and do taxes, but hey, I guess that’s just how southern NH rolls.
One of the funniest parts of this particular unit was that we had to get”married” and have a “family.” I don’t remember which lucky boy I was paired up with, but I do remember that I was the one that had to handle the wedding and baby announcements. (Sounds eerily like real life, to me!)
Why bring this up? Well, as I’m sure you’re well aware, today is tax day. Like many of my peers, I’m still relatively new to the full-blown tax process – far gone are the days of the 1040EZ! Lucky for me, that middle school tax primer stuck in my head and I’m at least somewhat familiar with the forms and the process itself. For some of my friends, however, tax season falls into that lovely category of “why on earth didn’t anyone TEACH ME HOW TO DO THIS STUFF???”
Yes, I’m a freak, and I actually enjoy breaking out the Turbo Tax and all the insane forms every year. It’s satifying to finish, and I usually get money back in the end. (I know this means I’ve just given the government an interest free loan, but hey! At least I get that money back, unlike, oh I don’t know, Social Security.) The fact that I enjoy it, though, is probably tied to that unit back in my formative years. I know what I’m doing, because someone DID take the time to teach me. The vague familiar feeling of “hey, I’ve done this before,” makes everything that much less intimidating.
What lessons for adulthood do you think you missed out on?
PS: We didn’t really have egg babies, but we did do that experiment where you dropped an egg of the side of a building inside a contraption that (you hoped) was designed to keep it from breaking.
PPS: I think I named my egg, but this was a long time ago, so I don’t actually remember what the name was. Probably something related to a boy band.
April 15, 2009 at 9:11 pm
I’d like to say that the seventh grade “life unit” actually helped me with taxes, but I don’t think it did. I did it, but I don’t remember anything from it, other than making the wedding invitations. What is great about being a poor grad student surviving on an assistantship alone: I still get to file the 1040EZ. Sometimes being incredibly poor has its perks. 🙂
April 17, 2009 at 12:36 am
I’m impressed that that unit helped you. I, like Sarah, do not remember anything about it, other than thinking it was a bunch of lines and numbers I wouldn’t need to know about for approximately 1 million years. Sadly I estimated wrong and it was more like 6 years, but hey. Oh, and I remember being annoyed that whichever boy I was paired up with didn’t seem interested in taking part in any of it.