Financial education is fundamental to guarantee a future life with a healthy economy, and the earlier children are educated about the value of money and its management, the more likely they are to become adults with healthy saving and consumer habits.

Learning can be adapted according to age, for example, explaining to younger children (0-9 years) the importance of money in life and how to manage it properly, and to teenagers (10-15+ years) how to plan income and expenses in the short and long term, as well as to analyze and understand financial risks. For this goal, a good strategy is to encourage financial learning in a playful way through games.

On Internet, you can find free online video games for kids, with which you can teach in a practical way how the world of money, entrepreneurship, economics, finance and business works.

For adults like me, who received nothing financial education, it’s great news that the new generations have these tools for learning, and not have to face an economy in adulthood without financial information.

It’s to use money to buy something, or consume with use. It’s essential that expenses be less than income, so that the surplus can be saved. It’s also important to know the difference between "good" debt that finances the acquisition of assets (that can generate a return, such as education) and "bad" debt that finances the acquisition of liabilities (such as toys or clothes).

This is the money received from an economic activity. Incoming money can come from a salary received for the work performed or from income derived from a own business or passively.

It’s to reserve part of the money that is available, not to waste money nor resources. The control of expenses allows us to save in order to be able to face unforeseen events.

It’s to allocate the capital goods to obtain some benefit that helps us to overcome periods of crisis or that can be sold in the future once they have increased their value.

Is a simple physics puzzle video game about real state which also encourages recycling. The game focuses on treehouse building and takes place in a in neighborhood, where you can progress through downtown. Play through 22 levels spread across 3 areas: Hero Elementary, Downtown, and Citytown Park.

In the construction phase, you must fit the colored blocks on the left side of the screen on the base of the tree house, so that the triangular roof where the squirrel is balanced and does not fall when it is released by the drone. You can rotate the colored blocks so that they fit in the best position. 

In the recycling phase, you must choose which blocks are not essential to maintain the balance of the tree house roof, and place them in the recycling garbage can. In this way, your children will learn to be more efficient with resources.

If you want your kids to learn to count money and make change, this video game is a good option. You can choose the language you prefer, and choose between three levels of difficulty, with coins of 1, 5 and/or 10 cents. 

At the top of the screen you will see the price in dollars of each of the gumballs, and you will have to put the exact amount of money for the gumball machine, making combinations with coins of different denominations. If you finish of change, you can use the currency converter at the bottom right. When you have bought all 8 balls of gum, this game will end.

This was my favorite video game, where you and your child must play as a supermarket cashier. Just enter the price of the product in the cash register, and press the "+" button to bill the next product. If you make a mistake there is a clear button you can use to erase the prior input. When you have finished shopping, press the "Total" button and look at the amount.

Next, your customer will give you his payment, so you should enter the amount in the cash register, and press "Pay", then you will see the amount of change you should give to the customer.

Press the correct amount of bills and coins in the cash register, and when you are done, press "Done". And if, on the contrary, the customer pays with gift certificate, you will not receive a change, just enter the amount, the negative sign and then click the "Done" button.

Just one more thing, all this operation must be done before the time bar at the bottom of your screen is finished, remember that there are more customers waiting in the queue!

This is a great simulation game to understand the world of profitability and investments. Start your pet store business by buying a hamster, which will produce your first coins (collect them by clicking on each pet at timed intervals). 

As the game progresses, you will have to reinvest by buying more pets, such as cats, dogs and rabbits, which will produce more and more money. In your shopping cart, you can buy upgrades to speed up production time and maximize your earnings. 

You can promote your pets on social networks, and for one hour at a time you will double the speed of your income. Just remember that periodically you will have to click on each pet to collect the accumulated earnings, and grow the business by buying more animals!

Knowing about programming language is an essential tool nowadays, and if you want to help your children to decipher its logic, this mental agility game is excellent. The purpose of the video game is to provide the necessary movement codes to help a panda bear move around the board until it reaches its food, the bamboo. The game has 32 unlockable levels of difficulty.

The idea is to fit the blocks with north, south, east or west direction, tracing the panda's path to the bamboo, avoiding tripping over the bushes. At the top of the screen, you will find the count of pieces you need to execute the command, and when you have completed it, press the "When Run" key and the panda will start to advance on the grassy path.

If you get the wrong command, you can drag it to the trash can and redo the command. As you progress through the game, you can use repeat blocks and indicate how many times to repeat a direction or multiple directions in a single move. Jump over bushes or any other tiles in any direction, placing your landing 2 or 3 squares from the square you jumped.

I especially loved this logic game, where you must guide your robot to the goal, dodging the yellow and black striped walls, and before the robot discharges. 

The idea is to drag the red buttons with the direction arrows to guide your robot to the goal, taking into consideration the direction in which your robot will advance by default. When you finish, press the green Play button, and if you make a mistake, you can start again with the yellow Start Over button.

Which of these was your favorite video game?

Jessymar Daneau Tovar (@letroupe)