Recession fourth 'R' in education - Yahoo! News UK

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Interesting Read. We know that this recession will impact our society long after this is technically over. Here is some indication how this will happen.

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Recession fourth R in education
http://uk.news.yahoo.com/21/20090412/tuk-recession-fourth-r-in-education-6323e80.html
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The recession has become the fourth R in addition to the traditional educational trinity of reading, writing and arithmetic, according to a survey.


More than half (51%) of all parents are teaching their children about the economic downturn, with over six in 10 (62%) believing it is important their offspring grasp the current situation.

But although parents are taking teaching their children about the recession into their own hands, many believe schools should do more to educate pupils about financial matters, according to the survey of more than 2,000 people by The Co-operative Child Trust Funds.

Almost two thirds (64%) of parents say children should be taught more about savings and investments, more than a third (37%) think interest rates need more attention from teachers, and similar numbers say the same of tax and national insurance (41%) and Government support such as child tax credits (28%).

Children also seem intrigued by the economic situation, with almost half (49%) of parents revealing their children had asked them about what was going on - although 7% of parents felt they did not understand the economy well enough to explain it to their inquisitive offspring, with some even learning about finance from their children.

Zack Hocking, head of Child Trust Funds at The Co-operative Investments, said: "Parents clearly don't want to shelter their children from the realities of the credit crunch and are making extra efforts to improve their understanding of finance.

"It's possible that one good thing to emerge from the current downturn will be a generation that's financially wiser and better equipped to manage their money through times of economic uncertainty."

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