Many families introduce their children to the world of work before they bring up the idea of entrepreneurship. But you don’t need to limit your children’s earning potential to baby sitting, dog walking or lawn mowing.
By offering your children some ways to earn pocket money through tech chores, you introduce them to life as a tech worker. If your children are old enough to tackle slightly more challenging tasks, they can even learn valuable tech skills while they’re helping out.
Starting small
Put little children to work with the kind of routine, time-consuming tasks that are tempting to avoid. They may not acquire a lot of tech skills in the process, but they’ll get more comfortable using devices and get used to the idea that it takes some work to keep everything running smoothly. To that end, you might put your elementary schooler in charge of:
Scanning business cards.When you come back from a conference, hand your child your phone, along with the collection of business cards you’ve accumulated. Ask your child to scan all the cards into your phone using an app like Evernote Scannable, CamScanner or Scanbot. Pay your child a nickel, dime or quarter per card.
Ripping CDs. In a world of Spotify and iTunes, it can be hard to justify that shelf full of CDs—but just as hard to throw them all out. Get your children to rip your collection and add them to your digital music library. Yes, you could achieve the same result by sending your collection to a ripping service, but they’ll charge 70 cents to $1 a disc—so if you can get Junior to do the same job for 25 cents a disc, you’re way ahead!
Managing cables. Look into the average home-media center, and you’ll see a cable snarl to rival Medusa. Hand your child a Sharpie and a roll of masking tape, ask him to label each cable at both ends and then unplug the whole setup: that will allow him to keep track of which cord goes with which device. Then you can have him unplug everything, de-snarl the mess and inspect it for any cables that weren’t actually plugged into anything. The job of putting it all back together is a great chance to strengthen spatial and logical thinking by finding the most sensible route for all the different cords.
Charging devices. With all the gadgets we carry around, it can be hard to keep every computer, mobile device and backup battery fully charged. Make it your child’s job to ensure that everything is plugged in and charging each night. As a bonus, this will ensure that everybody has to put away their phones and laptops at a specific time.
Getting advanced
Older children may have the tech know-how to undertake a range of tech chores—and if they don’t have it, then tech chores are a great way to acquire some new knowledge and skills. Consider asking a teen to take on a role like:
Tech support. This is a role that many families naturally delegate to their teen children, but even if you’re tech-savvy yourself, consider asking your child to help you solve technical problems like a crashing iPhone or a printer you can’t reliably access on Wi-Fi. Once your child gets the hang of how to Google for troubleshooting tips and follow instructions, she’ll be able to solve her own tech problems as well as yours.
System administrator. Once your child is old enough to trust with the password for your router and home computer (and isn’t going to abuse that trust by gaming 70 hours a week) you can turn her into your system administrator. Pay her to keep your operating system and apps up-to-date and your network running. If your child has some financial smarts, you can also assign her the job of regularly surveying competing telco providers to see if you can get a better deal on your home Internet, phone or TV service.
Graphic designer. If you have an artist in the house, you can put those visual skills to work on your next PowerPoint deck or social-media presence. Ask your child to turn your rough first draft into a polished deck with images and animated transitions, or get help creating an illustration or infographic to go with your next blog post.
Web manager. Whether you already have a website or blog or have been meaning to set one up, an industrious child can be your best ally. With minimal training (or just looking at a few how-to blog posts or videos), a child can undertake tasks like formatting blog posts, sourcing and adding images or reviewing and approving comments. A more advanced learner could take on the job of setting up a simple website in Squarespace or WordPress and keeping it up-to-date. Make sure you turn on automatic backups so any mistakes aren’t fatal!
Read the full article at: www.wsj.com
Chores done today could set your child up for a future in #tech. #entrepreneur #familybankgame
