Soft toys and football cards: educational collecting

Stones, football cards or pink cuddly toys: when children catch the collecting bug, there is usually no stopping them. Even the youngest children will roam through meadows and forests, looking for leaves and snail shells so that they can swap and compare items in the playground.

Collecting is more than just a hobby – it is a deeply rooted natural impulse. Children are curious by nature – this is already evident at preschool age (1–3 years). They want to own things, save treasures and be proud of the items they have collected. Collecting connects children, provides a topic of conversation and promotes a sense of belonging.

At the same time, collecting is often the first form of consumer behavior. As children get older, trends become more prevalent – and with them peer pressure, the compulsion to consume and the need to compare our status with others.

At school age, children take more and more care with their collections. They begin to organize, count and compare their treasures. At the same time, they also practice their mathematical thinking: counting, organizing and structuring are suddenly part of everyday life.

Over time, children become interested in more and more collectibles that are no longer easy to find in nature. Stickers, football cards or game pieces cost money. Social pressure also increases at this age: children collect Panini stickers to be able to take part in conversations and feel involved. But collecting gets more and more expensive – being part of the community has its price. So how should these constantly changing passions for collecting be financed?

A child can learn a lot by collecting. However, this doesn’t mean that parents have to finance everything. Learning to go without is just as important: not every wish has to be satisfied immediately. Children can keep a list or take a photo of the object they want, for instance. This makes a record of their wish without having to buy the item right away. In this way, they practice patience and develop a feeling for the value of objects.

With a limited collection budget, their collection will of course remain smaller – but swapping and bargaining with friends should be encouraged. This is often more satisfying than being able to buy everything all at once. Swapping items is a fun way for children to experience market mechanisms such as supply, demand, rarity and scarcity. Take advantage of the opportunity to explain how money works as a unit of exchange and how value is created.

As many school-age children already receive pocket money, they also have their own financial freedom and can contribute to the costs of their collections. And a child who saves up for something they particularly want is practicing budget planning. This turns pocket money and the fun of collecting into a learning experience: children decide for themselves what to spend their money on – and see how their choices affect their budget.

The child should also be allowed to make mistakes. If they spend all their money on trading cards, they won’t be able to afford anything else. This is all part of the learning process.

Parents and guardians can accompany children in this learning process. It helps to talk to children about prices and decisions, and to reflect on their sense of belonging to a group. It’s also important to make sure that the collecting bug doesn’t turn into collecting mania: adults should intervene when enthusiasm becomes compulsion, or when anger or disappointment take over.

More expensive collectibles are often the result of media hypes. If your child is enthusiastic about the latest trend, you should neither smile at it nor reject it outright. Show interest, maintain dialog and meet your child on their level. Even if certain hypes seem trivial to you – they are extremely important to your child at this particular moment in time. You should nevertheless explore the subject with your child: ask them if they really have to follow the trend, or if they can join in in the playground without having anything new in their collection.

Once the decision to buy an item has been made, determine together how much freedom the child has. How much money is available and what is the maximum amount they can spend? The child could also finance their collection exclusively out of their own pocket money. Talk about whether it is really worth it for the child. This teaches children that collectibles have a financial value and that they can’t carry on spending money endlessly to expand their collection.

It can also be effective to set a physical boundary, for example with a box in the children’s room to measure the extent of the collection. When it’s full, they have to sort out the items in it before they continue collecting. The main aim of a collection is not for it to be complete, but to search and hunt for items and swap them with others.

Major distributors are constantly organizing new promotions. This ultimately has an effect on children. The more they buy, the greater the reward in the form of collectibles. Children experience marketing mechanisms directly. Use the situation as a conversation starter: Why do brands organize these campaigns? What are the sales interests behind them? How much are the items worth financially? In this way, children learn to scrutinize advertising and offers, making it easier for them to make responsible consumer decisions later on.