Can we accidentally innoculate children against coin collecting?

[shirohniichan]

Is there a "right time" to interest young people in coin collecting? Is it possible to introduce them to coins at too early an age?

 

I ask this because I became interested in coins when I was in 3rd grade or so, and I have collected coins on and off since then. I took my older daughter with me to coin stores and coin shows a few times per year from the time she was about 4. Since she doesn't show too much interest in coins (beyond plugging her state quarter board or looking for bronze cents to use in the penny stretching machines), could I have accidentally innoculated her?

 

I wonder if waiting for a child to be interested in finding unusual coins to be a better method to introducing them to collecting than suggesting it to them before they really even know what coins are common and uncommon in change.

 

Maybe she never would have been interested.

 

Opinions?

[bsshog40]

Anybody that has raised at least one child to adulthood already knows that children's minds are very active, can have limited attention spans, and go thru phases of what interests them from one week to another. The one thing about a child learning new things is that even if they get bored with it down the road, the knowledge is still there if the interest in it ever comes back. Passion is what drives a person to the things they enjoy. I think passion resides in adults more than children. Children have to learn respect for something before they can become passionate for it. Respect takes a long time to learn. I don't feel this can be taken for not having interest in something like coin collecting but mainly just going along lifes path until it is something that draws them from the heart. I think for a child, coin collecting to them is something different and new that interests them for a while, whereas to us, (of course I'm 51 yrs old) I have already been thru many interests and hobbies until my passion for coin collecting has come back to me after 20yrs from the first time I collected. A short answer to your question "NO". JMO

[cpm9ball]

Well said, Bobby. Next to me, I think you'e the oldest child I know.

 

Chris

[JStull]

Well said, Bobby. Next to me, I think you'e the oldest child I know.

 

Chris

 

[bsshog40]

Well said, Bobby. Next to me, I think you'e the oldest child I know.

 

Chris

Yes sir my friend!! (thumbs u

[Walkerfan]

I agree w/Bobby. If you brought her to shows/shops at such a young age, this doesn't mean that you turned her off to it. She may be just too young to appreciate it. Maybe she'll suprise you in a few years and ask you to bring her again. It may be sparked by something in school or by a friend but she'll remember what you did for her. Wait a year or two and then bring her back another time. Maybe she won't ever be interested; who knows? But it won't be because of anything you did. I got REALLY passionate at about 9 or 10 years old but everyone is different. Then, it was on the back burner for me for MANY years but I ALWAYS loved it and it was always in the back of my mind. Even though there were times when I couldn't buy coins or wanted to focus my time and energy on other things. I still would look at coins or read about them from time to time. I then, rekindled it at about the age of 25 years old and it has been growing stronger ever since. Although, I have had a few years of inactivity in between, it was always there. My Dad got me involved, as well. The answer to your question is "NO". It was a GOOD thing that you did!

[mintcollector]

This is a great question/issue. I actually didn't become interested in coins until my twenties. I always collecting things, but it wasn't until I bought my first Silver Eagle that I truly felt like a true collector. Since then I collected off and on and only got back into the hobby a few years ago (still off and on). Now I am MUCH more serious about it...

[RWB]

There is a material known as "VAM" that will turn off kids in moments. Does not work as well on established collectors, but can be effective if expertly applied to the interested person.

[DWLange]

I was hooked on coin collecting by the age of seven, and I had no prompting from adults. My interest was entirely self-driven. I introduced my daughter to coin collecting when she was around nine but never pushed it. She enjoyed the pursuit for one summer and never thought about it again. I'll try again with her son a few years from now, but the collecting instinct is either there or it's not. I've seen the result of kids being force-fed the hobby by well-meaning adults at the ANA's Summer Seminar, and it's hell on the kids. Some people just can't accept that everyone is their own person.

[Oldtrader3]

VAM turns me off but I am over 60, maybe that is why, despite being an established collector.

[physics-fan3.14]

There is a material known as "VAM" that will turn off kids in moments.

 

I will say, Roger, that elicits deep yawns from even certain experienced collectors.

 

I tried to get my brother interested a while back, but he didn't have the bug. My sister seems to be catching on pretty well, though, she likes going to coin shows and picking out Mercury dimes for her thumb-buster.

[RWB]

I was being somewhat sarcastic - the point being that too much detail will cause kids to reject things.

 

To get kids involved, collectors have to "think like a kid."

 

[shirohniichan]

I reckon I won't try to win my 11-year old back to collecting by asking her to help me catalog trade dollar die varieties.

 

A few weeks ago she told me she liked going to the Long Beach show with me because we got to have lunch at a restaurant called "Islands" afterward. The first time I took her with me we had lunch with gmarguli, jamminj, and a few others when she was about 4 or 5, and she learned some new vocabulary from how dealers talk to collectors.

 

I bought her a Dansco album for the Prez Bucks, but we haven't received any in change since Adams. Maybe we'll find something that strikes her fancy.

 

I was the only coin collector in my family. What got me interested was seeing a display my older brother made for a class project. He glued an old French 20 centimes from the 1890s, a Japanese 5 sen from the Taishoh Era, and a few others in a cardboard box. Seeing unusual coins from a long time ago piqued my interest, so when my dad pulled out a coffee can with weird coins (corroded 2 cent pieces, a bent half dime, a Monroe Doctrine half, etc.) he picked up in change in the 1940s and '50s I was hooked. My meager allowance gave me the ability to buy an 1893 cent in good condition for 85 cents, a well-circulated 1879-O silver dollar for 3 bucks, and a few other goodies. I even dutifully polished a bunch of wheat cents to put in a Whitman folder.

[Conder101]

It's possible to get the bug vey young. I've been hooked since I was five, but whatLange sid is VERY true.

the collecting instinct is either there or it's not.[/quote ]

If it isn't there nothing will make a coin collector out of them. And even if it is there, don't count on them being really involved for more than a short time. Most collectors are exposed and participate only briefly before going dormant until their forties or fifties. Those who get interested young and stay in coins consistantly throughout their lives are fairly rare.

[RWB]

Those who get interested young and stay in coins consistantly throughout their lives are fairly rare.

 

Yikes! Sounds like another slabbing opportunity. I imagine a "register set" of relics from rare, coin collectors.

[Rigo-migration]

I personally can't say if there is a right time for teaching anyone because I have 3 kids. A 3 year old (girl), a 4 year old, and a 12 year old. The 12 year old started asking me questions about one of my hobbies (coins) when he was 10. Ever sense, he has been actively collecting coins (nothing toned like me), but only what he likes, my youngest boy (the 4 year old) asks me for coins when I'm searching for errors, looking at toners or selling and packaging, he always says "I like you coins daddy, specially the dimes". So I guess everyone is different. He follows everything his oldest brother does.

 

When you have an older brother/sister who does something or a parent who is always willing to answer a child's question, it is up to the child to chose whether he/she wants to pursue the hobby or not.

[michael]

i will innoculate anyone that wants to be

 

21 and over

 

please see me in balty.

[bsshog40]

He said inoculate, not inebriate!

[michael]

He said inoculate, not inebriate!

 

 

you got me figured to a tee (thumbs u