4 Ways That Consumer Math Prepares Your High Schoolers for Real Life

As homeschooling parents, all of us want to make the best decisions about what we teach our kids. We want to figure out how to best prepare them for the future. But this can be so overwhelming! Which history curriculum is the best? Which English material will help them learn what they need to know without causing undue frustration? Don’t even get us started on MATH!

This dilemma can be especially consuming once our kids reach high school. We have credit hours to account for, electives to choose, GPAs to track, and possibly, college requirements to consider. As parents and teachers of our kids, we shoulder the burden of ensuring our kids are as prepared as possible. Yet, we hope to take their individual personalities and interests into account. Some kids just aren’t made for the precalculus life. Maybe this seems like the only option if we want our kids to be prepared for the next step in their lives.

Enter consumer math. Maybe you’ve heard of consumer math as the “easy way out” or a “throw away” math credit. Perhaps you’ve even held this view yourself. But this just isn’t true! Just like we need to know the order of operations (shout out to PEMDAS) in order to solve for the unknown “x” factor, our kids need to know how math applies to their life so they are ready to use it.

What Consumer Math Can Do for Your High Schooler

Consumer math is all about real math for everyday life. It’s about knowing how to approach the problems that our kids will encounter in adult life and understanding how to solve those problems. If we want all those math courses our kids have taken so far to pay off and actually help them, they need to know how to apply those math principles! Instead of encountering a problem or unfamiliar situation and giving up, our kids should be able to think critically, determine how to find a solution, and take action.

Your student doesn’t just need to know how to solve for “x.” They need to learn how to translate real-life scenarios into equations they can solve. This is what consumer math will teach them!

1) Teaches Them How to Set Realistic Goals

How many times have we set goals and failed to meet them? I’ll be the first to say that I like setting optimistic goals but also struggle to meet them. When I fail to meet several goals, one after the other, I can start to get discouraged. Sometimes I even wonder if I will ever be able to meet any goals at all.

Half the problems we encounter in life are the result of setting unrealistic goals for ourselves. We fail to evaluate the time or resources we need to accomplish our plan. Consumer math can help your high schooler learn how to plan out their end goal, divide their goals into manageable steps, and allot the proper amount of resources towards accomplishing that goal!

The most valuable thing your student can learn is how to apply the knowledge they already have. Whether they are wanting a job, a car, to prepare for college, or to start their own business, consumer math will teach students how to logically assess their “x” and plug in the work, planning, and resources to get there.

2) Helps Them Look Ahead to Possible Careers

Have you ever looked back and thought “if only I had known what I know now!”? Think about the difference it could make for your kids to experience and learn more about the career they’re interested in BEFORE paying for a degree or other training and certifications needed. This could save them years they would spend working towards a goal that might change overnight. Maybe they could figure out that the career they want won’t provide for a big family. Maybe they would learn that a profession requires years of training they don’t want to pay for. Perhaps they would understand the intentional effort and work needed in order to be successful in that career.

Consumer math provides an opportunity for your kids to work with the numbers around their next step in life. Whether they have a plan for entering college or want to jump straight into the workforce, crunching the numbers can help them make the best choice for their situation and career goals. They can actually learn to answer questions like “how much does it cost to support a family?” and “what will this career choice mean for my tax responsibility?”. They will also be challenged to calculate the cost of the certifications or degree(s) they will need in order to pursue their dream career as well as the starting salary they could expect.

3) Allows Them to Practice Careful and Intentional Money Management

One of the biggest make-or-break parts of adulthood is learning to manage money. Most of us have our first job in high school or college before we have to pay for everything ourselves. But maybe you had the same experience I had. When real life hit and I moved out, started paying bills, and learned to grocery shop, the amount of money I discovered I needed was shocking and discouraging.

Your kids don’t have to be blindsided by the details of budgeting, saving, wise investing, lifestyle choices, and frugal shopping! Instead, they can learn what a good budget includes, how much they should be saving, what a wise investment looks like, how to best use their resources, and even how to avoid debt and predatory lenders. Maybe they won’t absorb every detail right now. That’s not exactly the goal anyway! They just need to become familiar with the information that will help them make good choices and avoid harmful ones.

4) Gives Them the Opportunity to Learn How to Research and Plan Projects

My husband and I recently bought a home and immediately experienced the “in over our heads” feeling. We found project after project that would need to be completed sooner or later. As we evaluated new issues that needed to be addressed (like a water heater leak) our project budget went through quite a bit of re-prioritizing, stretching, and re-allocation. We were able to do it, but it took some maneuvering. By investigating the cost of materials and labor, we realized there were many things we could do ourselves that would save us thousands of dollars! However, without the ability to think critically about the problems we were facing, we wouldn’t have come to this conclusion.

By nature, consumer math has a project-based application focus. As your students work through calculations for various scenarios life tends to present us, they can gain the experience necessary to identify issues and solve problems they are facing. Instead of seeing these things as scary or impossible, they can grow confident in their ability to find a good solution. From budgeting for a project, to replacing carpet, to working with contractors to have their roof replaced, consumer math teaches high schoolers the life skills they need to succeed.

Help Your Kids Prepare for Life with Consumer Math

Consumer Math for Real Life provides a full math credit and allows your high schoolers to dive deep into real life scenarios in order to apply the math concepts and principles they learn. Let your kids experience calculating the cost of college. Encourage them as they research what life might look like in their dream career. Support them as they learn to do their taxes, work to create a budget, and get hands-on experience calculating how to invest wisely. By working through this project-based curriculum, your kids will learn how math applies to real life and understand that God cares how they use the resources and abilities He has given them.