Are you looking for a fun and educational book to spark your child’s interest in financial literacy? Look no further than Loose Change – Tina Learns to Save by Sonia Rach.  

We’re excited to offer a chance to win one of five copies of Sonia’s book.   

Loose Change – Tina Learns to Save is a children’s book that combines storytelling with valuable lessons about money management.  

Authored by Sonia Rach, this book follows Tina, a curious young girl who embarks on a journey to understand the importance of saving money.  

Through colourful illustrations and relatable scenarios, children can learn essential financial concepts in a way that’s both entertaining and easy to comprehend. 

Why financial literacy matters

Teaching children financial literacy from a young age sets them on the path to making better financial decisions in the future.  

By introducing concepts such as budgeting, saving, and sensible spending early on, parents and educators can empower children to develop healthy money habits that last a lifetime.  

Loose Change – Tina Learns to Save serves as a valuable tool in this endeavour, making learning about money management enjoyable and accessible for young readers.  

For more, check out our podcast with Sonia. 

About the author 

Sonia Rach is a financial journalist at FTAdviser, and author with a passion for financial education and literacy.  

With a background in financial journalism and a love for storytelling, she combines her expertise to create engaging content that educates and inspires children to become financially savvy individuals.  

Her first book for kids, Loose Change – Tina Learns to Save is a testament to her commitment to empowering the next generation with essential life skills. 

How to win one of five copies

Participating in the competition is easy. Click the link below and fill the form with your details for a chance to win a copy of Loose Change – Tina Learns to Save.  

THE COMPETITION IS NOW CLOSED AND WINNERS WILL BE DRAWN AND CONTACTED

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Reading is such a great way to help your child through early development – whatever the book. 

Whether it’s a bedtime story, or a fun series like Mr Men, they can really add up to a lot of money. 

Luckily, there’s a deal right now that should stock you up with books to read for a super cheap price. Here’s everything you need to know.

What is in the deal exactly? 

Right now you can pick up a pack of 10 kids books for £10 – that works out at £1 per book. 

This offer is available both in store and online at The Works, and can be found nationwide. You may find however that there may be much more availability online. 

It’s particularly good for the savings that you get from it. Usually bundle packs of 10 books like this can cost as much as £69.90, so to get it for a tenner is a steal. 

With the discount down to £10 for a bundle, it’s saving up to 86% off the normal retail price. 

There are 19 different bundles in total to choose from, and range in ages from young babies all the way up to 10 and early teenage years. 

You can choose between a variety of different book styles and genres. This includes Mr Men, Elmer, Kipper the Dog and classic bedtime stories. 

All of the options available are picture books, so there’s plenty for you child to look and and take in while browsing through the books. 

You can order them online, where you can get free click & collect in store, or order them for delivery.  

You’ll pay £3.99 to have it delivered, unless you spend £25 or more in total, in which case delivery is free. 

Why should I care? 

You could quite easily pay between £5-10 per book for kids nowadays, so to get a bumper bundle for £1 each is great value. 

If you know anyone with kids too, it would make a nice little gift for them. It’s also very rare to find deals or offers on books also – so now is a good time to buy. 

What’s the catch? 

Bundles such as this can be very popular, so if you are heading into your local store to grab one, be prepared for a smaller selection. 

If you shop online, you’ll likely have more choice – and you can also get free click and collect on products over £10, which works nicely. 

What other options do I have? 

There are plenty of other kids books around, but it can be tricky to find them on sale. 

If you didn’t want the physical copies, you can usually find a lot of free kids books on places like Amazon, where you can browse through the book on an iPad or phone. 

Where can I find out more? 

Head over to The Works website, to view the full range of kids book bundles and to make a purchase. 

Photo credits: Pexels

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The thought of a school half term and the costs associated with it, will be daunting for some.

Keeping the kids entertained is never easy, and it’s even harder if you’re on a budget. Luckily there are a few deals floating about.

Here’s one that gets your kids some free brekkie throughout the whole of the half term period.

What is in the deal exactly?

If you have a school age child (or multiple school age children), taking them to a supermarket cafe will get you the deal.

Asda Cafes (which you can find nationwide) are offering this freebie. You can head to a cafe between 8am and 12pm each day and ask for the offer.

You don’t need any coupon or voucher to show to get it, just speak to the staff member, and you’ll get the free breakfast.

The only thing that’s included in the breakfast is a bowl of Quaker Oats porridge, so it might not be for a fussy eater – but still a nice little freebie for those that like it.

Parents… you don’t need to buy anything or be eating alongside your kids while taking advantage of this offer – there’s no minimum spend, so you can just get the freebie.

This offer will be running over the whole week of half term (from Monday 13th to Sunday 19th), so there’s plenty of time to claim it.

There’s nothing stopping you going there more than once too, if you wanted to feed your kids on the cheap over half term.

Why should I care?

Food is expensive at the best of times, so if you were already going to do a food shop during the school holidays, you can tie it in with a free breakfast.

It’s not the biggest freebie, but it’s a great initiative – and if your son or daughter likes porridge, then it’s a win win.

What’s the catch?

You do have to have a school age child (16 or under) to get the deal.

The Asda website says that there are 50,000 bowls of porridge available around the country during the promotion, but there’s no indication of how many each store has, or what happens if they run out.

It’s probably something to do at the start of the half term week just in case, but I see it unlikely that they’d turn people away if asking for it.

What other options do I have?

During half term week, you can find a lot of deals on meals for kids. If you can’t get there for breakfast, Asda Cafe is also doing a kids meal for £1 nationwide.

Not only this, other restaurants and cafes such as Yo Sushi, Morrisons, Bella Italia, Sizzling Pubs, Angus Steakhouse, Hungry Horse and many more are offering deals. Usually kids eat for totally free with an adult meal purchase, or for £1.

Where can I find out more?

Head over to the Asda website for the full details of the deal, but head into an Asda Cafe during half term to pick it up.

Photo by Melissa Belanger on Unsplash

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Mouthy Money Your Questions Answered panelist Laura Suter answers a reader’s question about finding the most tax-efficient home for their children’s savings.  

Question: What is the best way to save for your children’s future? We have £1,000 a month to save (for two children) and have been advised to put this into an active managed ISA that has fees of 1.87% in our name. Are there more tax-efficient saving vehicles? Would a passive investing approach be better? CR, North Shields

Answer: Firstly, congratulations on putting aside money for your children. It’s often a task on a parent’s to-do list that they never quite get around to. And having £1,000 spare each month for your two children is going to give them a great savings pot for their future life.

Let’s tackle the issue of the account type first.

You could save it in an account under your name, as the adviser has suggested, but this will use up some of your ISA allowance. 

Each adult has a £20,000 annual ISA allowance, so your children’s savings will take a £12,000 chunk out of that for one of you. If you have additional spare money each month that you want to save for yourself, this might prevent you from doing so within an ISA. 

In the worst case you could end up with savings outside an ISA that you then have to pay tax on, that you could have otherwise sheltered from tax in an ISA.

An alternative is to put it in ISAs under your children’s names, in a Junior ISA. Each child is entitled to one of these and you can put up to £9,000 a year into the accounts.

If you split the money between your two children, you’d be putting £6,000 a year into each of their accounts. 

Using a Junior ISA means the money is ringfenced for the child, so you can’t take it out until they turn 18. This has benefits, as you can’t be tempted to dip into it. But it also means you need to be sure that you won’t need it for anything else.

Your next question centres around the type of investment to pick. Your adviser has suggested an actively managed fund, while you suggest a passive approach might be more suitable. There’s no right answer to this, it comes down to preference. 

Put simply, a passive investment approach will cost you less but will only track the performance of the market – never outperform it. With active management you’re paying more to have a fund manager pick stocks for you, but the hope is that this will generate a higher return.

There’s no need to sit entirely in one camp, you could mix the two approaches. For example, having a broader UK stock market tracker and then using an active fund for a more specialist area, such as technology stocks or emerging markets.

Another option is to pick an all-in-one fund, which can be active or passive. These invest in a mixture of different assets and mean you only need to invest in one fund that is already diversified, rather than picking lots of different investments.

When investing for your children it’s important to keep the timeframe in mind. You don’t mention how old your children are, but if they are young you could have 15 or more years until they will access the money at age 18. 

This makes for a decent investment horizon and means you could potentially take more risk with the money, as you have time to ride out the ups and downs of the market. 

Of course, some parents would prefer to play it safe with their children’s savings – it’s down to personal preference and attitude to risk.

Laura Suter is head of personal finance at AJ Bell.

Laura Suter is head of personal finance at AJ Bell. She is a multi-award winning former financial journalist, having specialised in investments. Laura joined AJ Bell from the Daily Telegraph, where she was investment editor. She has previously worked for adviser publications Money Marketing and Money Management,and has worked for an investment publication in New York. She has a degree in Journalism Studies from University of Sheffield.

Mouthy Money Your Question Answered compiled by Rebecca GoodmanHave you got a money question? Find out how to get your query answered

Photo by Tanaphong Toochinda on Unsplash

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It’s nearly the October half term break, and many parents might be feeling daunted by the prospect. Not just around the financial side, but also keeping them entertained.

Luckily, there are a ton of kids eat free offers that have sprung up to give you a cheaper day out over the next few weeks.

Here’s all the details and what restaurants are taking part.

What is in the deal exactly?

For most of these offers, you’ll get a free kids meal at a restaurant when an adult is there and dining too.

The ages of the child varies per restaurant. Some are for any kids under 16 and some have age restrictions.

The food that the kids get also varies, as it can be given from a set menu, or they get a free choice of anything they’d like.

Here are the restaurants that have announced they’re taking part, and some information about how it works:

Angus Steakhouse (Valid During School Holiday Dates)

Kids under 10 eat for free from 12pm-5pm with a full price adult.

Beefeater (Exp: Unknown)

Two children under 16 eat breakfast for free with a full paying adult.

Frankie & Benny’s (Exp: 21st Oct in Scotland, 28th Oct in England, 4th Nov in Wales & NI)

Grown ups go free when dining with a child under 11. One free adult meal per child. Must sign up for the Frankie’s newsletter.

Hungry Horse (Exp: 31st Oct)

Kids get a free breakfast before 12pm with a full paying adult.

M&S Cafe (Exp: 28th Oct)

Kids eat free when you spend £5 or more in the M&S Cafe.

Morrisons Cafe (Exp: Unknown)

Kids under 16 eat for free with a full priced adult meal.

Tesco Cafe (Exp: 28th Oct)

Kids eat free with any adult purchase (which can be as little as 60p). Must have a Tesco Clubcard.

The Real Greek (On Sundays in October)

Kids under 12 eat free all day when an adult spends £10 or more.

Yo! Sushi (Exp: 28th Oct)

One kids meal free for every adult who spends £10 or more (maximum of three free kids meals per table).

Why should I care?

Half term can be daunting for a lot of parents, especially as the cost of everything is going up. Even if it’s a few pounds here and there you’re saving – it could make a big difference (and get you all out of the house).

Offers like this don’t crop up too often, so it’s good to take advantage when they come around.

What’s the catch?

As all of these deals vary in their T&Cs, it’s worth double checking the one you’d like to go for before heading there to check it’s on the right day, time or location.

Also… you’ll need to have a child with you to get these deals. You may find the long term investment of having children may outweigh any savings made – but at least everyone gets fed for a bit cheaper!

What other options do I have?

If you don’t have a child or just want to find other restaurant offers, you can always have a google before you go. There are currently offers on at restaurants such as Pizza Express, Bella Italia and Prezzo available to everyone that might give you a small percentage off.

Where can I find out more?

Head down to a restaurant of your choice this half term – but do check all the T&Cs before you go.

Photo by Kyle Nieber on Unsplash

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Summer holidays are coming up, which means you might be thinking about things to keep the kids entertained while they’re off school.

If your kids need something to do over the summer holidays, then this is a pretty good deal from Wacky Warehouse.

Here’s everything you need to know:

What is in the deal exactly?

For £12, your child can get unlimited use of a local Wacky Warehouse play centre for 6 weeks over the summer holidays.

The deal is called the ‘Summer Pass’, which is valid for both weekdays and weekends, and is available at any location.

Wacky Warehouse is a chain of soft play centres, mostly located in the South and the Midlands.

Normal admission for each child is around £5, so you’ll need to go at least 3 times to get your money’s worth.

If you need to buy more than one Summer Pass (if you have more than one child), they also offer 25% off up to 4 additional passes.

This means, after you’ve bought the first one for £12… subsequent passes will be £9. This could give you an even bigger saving if used regularly.

Not only could buying the pass save you money on entry, you’re also able to get 10% off food and drink when purchasing from the restaurants or cafes at each venue.

One of the offers they promote is a hot drink and a slice of cake for £2.99 – so with the Summer Pass discount, you can get it for £2.70.

To get the passes, you’ll need to head to your nearest play centre and purchase there (you can’t order online). Find your nearest Wacky Warehouse venue here.

Why should I care?

It can be very tough (and expensive) to entertain the kids over the school holiday period.

If you are struggling for ideas, it can be a cheap and easy win to take them to a soft play centre. Most should have air conditioning too, so if the weather stays hot – it’s a good excuse to stay cool while the kids burn off their energy!

What’s the catch?

There aren’t a huge number of Wacky Warehouse venues to choose from, so you may struggle if you live far away to use it enough.

Do check your local soft play centre to see if it’s worth it for you.

What other options do I have?

Soft play centres rarely offer deals, but if you were still looking for things to do with the kids, there are a number of restaurants that are offering free meals to children when an adult meal is purchased.

Restaurants such as Hungry Horse, Asda Cafe, Morrisons Cafe, Yo Sushi!, Bella Italia and more have some great deals on – so have a look out for those.

Where can I find out more?

You’ll need to go into a soft play centre to purchase the deal, but you can find out more about the deal, and search for your nearest venue on the website.

Photo by Duangphorn Wiriya on Unsplash

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