Needs and wants
What the words mean, why the line between them moves, and 24 cards to cut out and argue over.
A need is something you can’t be safe or well without. A want is everything else. Food, somewhere warm to live, clothes that fit and medicine are needs. Sweets, games and days out are wants.
The useful part comes next: the line between them moves. A coat is a need. That particular coat, with the badge on it, is a want. Most of what makes this worth teaching sits in that gap.
Explained three ways
5–6 Needs are things you can’t do without, like food and a warm bed. Wants are things that would be lovely, like toys. Both are allowed. Needs just go first.
7–8 Needs keep you safe and well: food, a home, warm clothes, shoes that fit. Wants are everything else. Grown-ups pay for the needs first, then decide what’s left over can go on.
9–10 A way of sorting spending by how essential it is. The hard part is that the line sits in a different place for different families, and being honest about which side something falls on is trickier than it looks.
The sorting activity
Cut out the 24 cards below and sort them into three piles. The third pile is the one that matters.
- Food for dinner
- A new video game
- A mobile phone
- Shoes that fit
- Sweets at the checkout
- The internet at home
- Clean drinking water
- A bicycle
- A fizzy drink
- A warm winter coat
- A coat with a badge everyone knows
- Medicine when you’re poorly
- A birthday present for a friend
- Somewhere warm to live
- Cinema tickets
- Trainers for PE
- A haircut
- Books
- A fourth teddy
- The bus fare to school
- A toothbrush
- A pet
- A washing machine
- A holiday
What to listen for
There is no answer sheet, and adding one would spoil it. A few cards are worth knowing about before you start, because they are the ones that produce the conversation.
- The two coats. Put next to each other, they do the whole lesson without you saying anything. A coat keeps you warm. The badge doesn’t. Ask what the extra money is buying.
- The internet. Twenty years ago, obviously a want. Now homework is set on it. A good answer is “it depends what you need it for”.
- The bus fare. A need if it’s four miles, a want if the school is round the corner. Same card, different answer, and that’s the point.
- Trainers for PE. Needed for school, but any pair will do. Children often spot this one on their own.
- A birthday present for a friend. Nobody is unwell without it, and yet almost every child argues hard for it. Worth letting them.
If a child puts something in an unexpected pile, the reason is more interesting than the pile. “Why did you put it there?” is the only follow-up you need.
One thing to be careful of
For some children, the cards in the first pile are not guaranteed at home. An activity about what everybody needs can land very differently depending on the house it lands in.
Two things help. Keep the talk about things in general rather than what your family has, and never ask a child to say what they go without. Nobody should end up explaining their family’s finances to a room.
When money is tight goes further into this if it’s useful.
Where to go next
Spending It Well is the children’s version, written three ways, and it carries on into the tricks adverts use to turn a want into something that feels like a need.